Order and Chaos
by WedgePalmer
Summary: There was a clan of gods known as the Clan of Order. Their aim was to prevent the world from falling into chaos. One day, an evil god known as Nemesis rose up and destroyed them, with his newly formed 'Clan of Chaos'. Can three young gods stop him? R R!
1. Land of Order

_Once, long ago,__ there was a great godly Clan. A clan is handy for allied gods, as it means they cannot take over each-other's towns because (in effect) they are shared between the clan. _**Negai**_ (the power of the people's prayers) is shared, along with wood, food and other natural resources. Anyway: this particular clan was known as the clan of Order. Its duty was to fight gods that sought to bring the word to its knees, and to defend each other. It was like the clan was one big family, with over thirty gods and goddesses in it. They knew that if there was any one ruler of Earth, it would fall into Chaos. They were not biased, either. There was a generous mix of good and evil gods, making it an effective fighting force._

_But all forces have a weakness._

_The leader of the clan, a god of evil, was married to a good goddess.__ On the day of their Betrothal, a great enemy of the clan, Nemesis, rose up and killed the pair by destroying their temples. The Clan fought bravely, but Nemesis had brought several allies with him, and one of the clan, a cowardly, corrupt god called Lethys, betrayed them and attacked from behind. The Clan was slaughtered and their temple's destroyed; their villages either burned to ash and ruins, or taken over by the Dark Clan._

_But there was hope for the Clan__. On another part of the island, a group of young gods and goddesses were being educated in the ways of the Order. We join them shortly before the attack…_

"I submit!" The god cried out. The red-haired goddess who he was sparring against smiled in a cruel, but strangely charming way, and then stepped away from him. She sheathed her slender, ivory-handled Katana and put one hand on her shapely hip. He stood, retrieved his Polearm and fiddled with it nervously. He was a medium height male god, who looked about twenty. His simple black leather armour and knee-length cloth greatcoat gave him an appealing, undemanding look (although nobody admitted it, and he didn't know what they thought of him). His skin tone was mixed race, and his black hair, and rectangular beard on his chin almost amplified the sheepish look on his face.

"What's the matter, **Toku**?" she teased "too much for you?"

"Whatever, **Saitaku****, **don't get too worked up about beating me…" He tried to act tough, but his soft brown eyes sort-of spoiled the effect. The corner of one cherubic lip curled in a smile again, and she flicked her shoulder-length red hair from her face and stared at him with her electric-blue eyes. Her face was a small, heart shape with a pointed chin, and her small shoulders and arms looked like they lacked the power to take down the god who was half a head taller than her. She was clothed in a pair of plain brown trousers, a pair of boots and a shirt/tunic of some kind of powder-blue silk.

"When you two are quite done flirting…" A voice sighed, making both deities jump out of their skins.

"I'm going to skin you alive, **Omoi…**" Saitaku hissed, reaching for her Katana. The newcomer was also average height for a twenty year old. His black hair went well with his black tunic and grey/blue trousers. He wore a silver chain around his neck, and his green eyes were hidden beneath his fringe. He wore no visible weapon, but they knew better than to judge him by that. His neck chain could morph into a barbed whip/flail weapon.

"Whatever…" He sighed. "I've just come to inform you that it's time to choose our creatures…"

"WHAT!?" Toku and Saitaku both exclaimed.

"Yeah, come on. We can't start without you."

Toku was exasperated that they had not been informed by their mentor (a god called Khazaar) that one of the most important events of a god's life was to take place now. The three of them took off and hovered for a moment, before swooping to the crescent-moon shaped valley which made up the trainee's land. There were four towns in this little swathe of beach and grass. One had the characteristic wooden structures of the Norse humans, one was made up of tents and tipi's (Red Indian) and two were made up of solid stone and slate buildings. The path to the rest of the island was situated behind Saitaku's Temple, which was on a hill in the upper corner of the semicircular patch of land. Omoi had his in the bottom corner and Toku had built his home upon the cliff, where it curled to the right of Omoi's realm. As this was only a small land (for thirty-three gods and goddesses), the recruits were only allocated a single town each. Their 'homework' was to fulfill desires or generally expand. Khazaar had his own land beyond the path from this area. There was another way out of the 'Training Pen' (as it had become known). This was a pass through the mountains that was blocked off by a set of twenty-meter-high gates. None of the recruits were permitted through this area, and there was nothing there anyway (from what they could see when they flew overhead).

Khazaar waited for them beside the huge gates. He was dressed in a fur cloak and wore leather armor underneath it. His Nordic longsword was sheathed at his hip and there was a round shield on his left arm. He had shoulder-length blonde hair and a long, drooping moustache.

"You've got something on your face, Khazaar." Omoi said, touching down a few metres ahead of the others.

"Very funny" his teacher drawled, toying with the edges of his moustache. "As you know, this is the day you shall receive your creature. There will be more lessons on them later, but for now…"

He raised his hands and a bracelet appeared on each of the trainee god's wrists. Carved into each one was that God's (or Goddesses') symbol. Omoi had the Yin/Yang, Toku had a Circle, and Saitaku's was the Three Legs (the flag for the 'Isle of Man' in real life!).

"Through this gate are three wonderful creatures." A voice said. The three trainee gods looked around at the gates themselves and found that a human with dark skin, leather animal-handler's clothes and brown hair had emerged from a small side-gate that was in the corner of the larger one. "I am Sable, a trainer of creatures."

"Cut the Crap, let's go in!" Saitaku hissed to her friends.

"Sssh!" Toku hissed back.

"You shall enter, pick the creature you wish to make your own and then go back to your respective towns." Sable went on. At her words, the gates gave a great creaking groan and swung open. Light glared in at the valley beyond, and they entered.

Inside, new sounds and scents caught them. The smell of grass and nature was very strong here, and there was the gurgle of a stream nearby. They reached a small hill, and found what they had been looking for atop it. Three creatures stood there. The tallest, most muscular was a shaggy-furred grey wolf. It was currently engaged in a scrap with a reddish-haired ape. The ape had short, stubby legs, but strong, muscular arms which delivered a blow to the side of the wolf's torso, and knocked him down. The wolf, however, was crafty and lashed out with a foot sweep that brought the ape to the floor with it. Behind the dueling twosome was a lazy looking cow creature. It was a brown-white colour with big ears and a blunt snout, and its hooves were shaped in likeness to human hands. He was the shortest, stoutest creature present. His belly jutted out ahead of him and he sat in an amused silence, watching the fighters as though this was nothing new. The short Cow was still massive, over four metres tall and still just a baby creature. The Ape was around four and a half and the Wolf was five metres tall. Saitaku stepped forward instantly. She was the best fighter of the three and chose her creature to match this. She raised her arm and a leash shot from the bracelet and attached itself to the wolf's fluffy neck. The wolf raised its paw and felt the leash had attached itself to a strange collar that had appeared there, with Saitaku's symbol on it. It gave a startled bark and tugged a couple of times, before falling silent. Saitaku used the leash to call it to her side. The Ape gave a frightened yelp and reached out a hand towards its sparring partner, but there was no response. It dropped its hand and was silent. Toku turned to Omoi.

"Which one are you going to choose? Do you want to go first?" He asked. Omoi shook his head:

"I can't decide, you go first"

They realized that they had been talking in whispers. It was natural: this was like a holy place. There was no sign of human's living here and these creatures had cared for the small valley. It showed this in its beauty and Toku felt sad to take its carers away. He thought of which creature to take. He was a mainly good god (about 70 good), and the cow was a powerful ally to the good. However, he needed a creature which adapted fast and learned well what he taught it. He walked up to the ape and scratched its belly. It gave a happy 'oook' noise and he leashed and led it away.

The cow (realizing that its friends had been taken from it) stood, gave a frightened 'Moooo…' and put its hooves to its snout in a gesture of fear. Omoi walked up to it and gave it a reassuring pat on the head. It calmed down and he also leashed his cow.

"Let's go back to Sable and Khazaar." Omoi sighed. They led their creatures back up the valley to their new homes.

Meanwhile, beyond the valley of creatures and beyond the wedding of two great gods which the friends knew nothing about, there was a cliff overlooking the town in which the wedding was taking place. A spot on the cliff suddenly seemed to warp and distort, and a column of light burst from it. A vortex appeared there, a hole filled with swirling light that threw out bits of rock and trees from the other side (wherever that was). A figure appeared. He was tall (almost 7ft) and had shaggy black hair. His piercing, emerald green eyes stared down at the oblivious gods and humans partying below, and he reached up to his back and drew a Masamune sword that glinted in the dying sunlight. Behind him, blocks of human soldiers, Aztec warriors with club/swords, began to march from the portal.

"Orders, my lord?" one man, in a massive feathered headdress asked him.

"Kill them all…" Nemesis rasped.

_Ooooh! Nemesis is here. Run and hide!! Will our hero's escape alive (well probably, otherwise it would be a very short story…)_


	2. Dark Horizons

The town was aflame as mortal and god died side-by side. Nemesis had to admit, the Clan fought bravely, but they fell easily to his blade. On either side of him, Aztec warriors with sword/clubs and shields whooped and called as they felled villagers and guards. The town in question was a Greek one, with the lightly-armoured spearmen as its standing army. They died as his veteran force swept through like a breeze through leaves, and there were not many left now. He smiled. A large number of gods' temples had been on the side he had attacked from and they had burned them to the ground, killing the gods as they did so. His blade was seeped in blood and he paused to clean it. Beside him, a stone house collapsed in on itself and smoke billowed skywards. On his other side, two hoplites appeared, clutching short swords, but they were slain by a squad of Aztecs. Ahead, a figure swooped from the sky and landed before him. This god was dressed in full, crimson, samurai armour and carried a pair of katanas. Behind him, a bodyguard of ten samurai spearmen pushed through the smoke and fog.

"Monster! You will die by my hand" He roared, accusingly, and swung both blades in a left-hooked slash. Nemesis blocked the strike lazily, and cast a point-blank lightning miracle. The fluorescent flash injured and (temporarily) blinded him. He drew back a step, and then lashed out violently with his masamune, lopping his head off. As the head was severed, he saw the flesh trying to knit back together (it is very hard to kill a god in _actual _combat, as they heal fatal wounds automatically) but the masamune was powered by the creeds that he had acquired, and the healing failed. There was a flash of orange light, which faded to white, and the body fell to the ground. On the other side of the town a Japanese-looking temple shuddered and exploded as its god died, showering the surrounding area with wood and stone. The Samurai spearmen died easily as he hacked them down with the weapon, and he laughed at their feeble attempts to kill him. He reached a clearing and found that chairs and tables had been set up here in a likeness to a wedding. Beside him, four other gods of the Dark Clan regrouped with him. Though few, the Dark Clan accepted only powerful gods into its ranks. One of his allies pointed with a broadsword that gave off a red smoke from its blade.

"It is Eidolon and Claria!" He hissed. Nemesis saw them on the other side of the clearing: They were holding hands and both had their weapons drawn. One of the Clan, Lethys, had stayed behind to guard its leaders whilst the rest of the guests had spread out to fight the attackers in different parts of the city. Behind the three Clan members, two massive temples were situated. One was a deep crimson, with spikes arranged like thorns around it and a massive spike that made up a gothic-looking roof. Its companion temple was the pearliest of whites, made of marble and had statues of angels decorating it. A fountain was in front of this one.

The two leaders of the clan readied their weapons as Nemesis and his allies approached.

"Nemesis!" hissed Eidolon, who was dressed in spiked, barbed armour and a high, horned helmet. His long-handled axe was stained in blood, and the bodies of several Aztec warriors lay at his feet. His wife, Clara, clutched her staff in white-knuckled hands, her white dress falling to the cobblestone streets and her sapphire-coloured hair descending to halfway down her back.

"How did you get to this island?" she asked, her high, royal sounding voice cutting through the cold night air.

"We had a friend of yours open a vortex for us." Nemesis said, coldly. He nodded to Lethys, who drew a long-bladed knife from his tunic and approached the couple. They turned too late, and he plunged the weapon into Eidolon's heart. Lethys did not have a creed of his own, but Nemesis had given him that creed-imbued knife to do just this. Eidolon fell to his knees before Lethys.

"At last…" Lethys hissed. "It is you who kneels before me."

"Up yours…" Eidolon gasped. He butted Lethys right where it hurts, hard, and he collapsed, just as the leader of the Clan crumpled to his side, and his temple cracked and crumbled in nearby.

"My Love!" Clara screamed. The whole incident had taken just five seconds and in that time, she had been readying a miracle. She was about to try and heal her husband, when there was the hiss of a blade cutting the air and Nemesis' masamune pierced her back and heart, before shattering her ribs and emerging from the front. She slumped on the end of the sword and he held that moment as though in a photograph or painting. Lethys spoiled it, by mewling and clutching at his injured groin, but he didn't care. Both of the Clan's leaders were dead before him, and he rejoiced. Victory was his.

_B__ack _in the training grounds, the trainee's had assembled with their respective creatures for their early-morning training. It was almost three in the morning, and the gods and goddesses had to care for their villages (well the good gods did) at around six, when people got up, and then come for an extra four hours training, before being given the rest of the day to themselves. Remember; Khazaar and the young deities had no idea of the invasion up north, and were going about their business as usual.

"The first thing most deities do when they receive a creature" Khazaar began "is to name it. It makes training a lot easier as creatures understand commands better and learns better if it has a name attributed to it."

"I've already thought of one…" Saitaku began, excitedly scratching her wolf's neck as she hovered beside it. "I shall call him **Letalis**!"

"Aye that is a good name. Omoi? What about your Cow?" Khazaar asked. Omoi thought for a moment, and then answered:

"I want to call him **Pius**." He said, quietly. The big cow looked down at his master, and mooed his appreciation. Khazaar nodded slowly. It seemed fitting as Omoi had already begun to teach him kindness and generosity (last night, he had showed his cow how to put food and wood from trees and fields into the village store).

"Okay, Toku. What do you want to call your ape?"

"He's called **Vir**." Toku answered, firmly.

"That's settled then." Their teacher said.

Vir the Ape, Pius the Cow and Letalis the Wolf were all shin-deep in a cold fog that suddenly seemed to have crept in on them. Saitaku sat on Letalis' shoulders and scratched his chin, causing him to yelp happily. Vir suddenly raised one hairy, red arm and gave a frightened screech, pointing at the gate to the creature pass. A figure had appeared from the pass and was approaching. Toku studied him, and recognised him. Their teacher suddenly hailed the newcomer:  
"Lethys! What brings you here?" He called. Lethys ran to him.

"We're under attack!" he shouted. Lethys was dressed similarly to Khazaar: leather armour, fur cloak, round shield, but he had shaggy black hair that looked like it had never seen a brush, and he had watery blue eyes, contrasted to Khazaar's electric blue. He carried a Nordic hunting spear, and had a long, thin dagger strapped to his leather armoured trousers.

"Is it just me, or is your voice a bit high this morning?" Khazaar asked

"Quiet! This is serious!" Lethys panicked.

"Definitely higher…" Khazaar muttered to himself. Then he said to Lethys: "Who is attacking us?"

Lethys stopped acting scared, and raised his spear and shield. An unpleasant, toothy grin came upon him.

"Me." He hissed. His thrust caught Khazaar off-guard and wounded him in the side; however, Khazaar raised his shield and drew his longsword sword without showing any signs of fear or pain, and parried the next strike with a swipe of his weapon. He glanced over at his trainees and then said:

"Are you still here? Get to the shore, it's too dangerous!"  
As if to confirm his words, he was hit in the leg by Lethys' spear. Its point pierced his leather armour easily and left a thin laceration there. With a grunt, he turned and swung at his opponent. His longsword nicked Lethys' shoulder but he dodged quickly enough to avoid a serious injury. The three heroes led their creatures to the shoreline, a few hundred metres away and watched the battle from there. Lethys made a clumsy jab at Khazaar, who dodged and placed a serious slash wound down the traitor's back. Lethys fell to his knees with his back to Khazaar, and for a moment, they though he'd won as he swung his weapon back for a strike, the way a golfer does with his club. Then there was a sound like paper tearing, and a lightning bolt hit their Norse teacher in the side. He fell to the ground and attempted to rise as Nemesis appeared from the fog. He was a tall god, almost seven feet tall, and carried a huge Masamune blade in one hand. The other was outstretched with the gesture of lightning. His split black leather coat whipped around him in the wind, and his smooth black steel armour moved soundlessly as though it was cloth. His hair was black and shaggy, but more like a lion's mane than a mess (like Lethys'). In his final few moments, Khazaar turned to look at his students. A beam of golden light shimmered into view on the water's edge, which expanded and became a whirling portal of bright greens, blues, reds and whites. A shield bubble blossomed over the three of them and the portal, and they were cut off from Lethys, Khazaar and Nemesis. Nemesis gazed at them for a moment, before beginning to advance past the fallen Lethys and the injured Khazaar, towards the protective bubble. Khazaar rose behind him and swiped with his sword. He knew that he had to buy the trio time to gather followers and escape. A few minutes! He could do that, even though he was injured in several places. Nemesis turned and they locked blades.

_Five minutes later:_

"Come on!" barked Saitaku. They had each gathered around twenty villagers (men women and children) and were hurrying them towards the vortex. There was no time to get supplies, and as they watched, Nemesis seemed to tire of toying with Khazaar. He flicked his Masamune to the left, and Khazaar's sword spun away from him. He then punched him in the face, breaking his nose and splattering blood along the grass, before knocking him down.

"Finish this…" he hissed to a recovered Lethys. Lethys growled indignantly, but tugged out his powerful knife and raised it above his head. The fallen Khazaar closed his eyes and the dagger came down and pierced his chest. As Khazaar died, Nemesis turned to face the heroes and pointed at them, with an evil smile on his face. Tears in their eyes, the three led their creatures through the vortex to whatever lay beyond, and it sealed shut behind them as its creator, Khazaar, died.

**Sorry, I know this chapter was a little short, but I wanted to finish Tutorial island/Clan HQ in one chapter and start the next island. In this story, all of the islands will be like their counterparts in the game, only bigger (mostly) and revamped. Get set for Island Two. Oh and by the way. I need a goddess's name. Anyone want to submit this? Just give me her name, weapon and alignment and she'll be in the story!**

**Wedge :3**


	3. Temple Trouble

Saitaku awoke. Her long-lashed eyes fluttered open and for a moment, all was a confused blur of colours and shades of darkness. There was something big above her, she realised. Blinking a couple more times, a long, grey muzzle became clear, and a pair of concerned blue eyes stared down at her.

"Letalis…?" she muttered, her throat hoarse. The wolf barked and shook his fur, his long, doglike tail wagging enthusiastically.

"_Mistress!" _a young, male voice filtered through to her mind, and she jolted awake.

"You can talk?" She said out loud.

"_Telepathically, we can. The amount of time to develop this skill varies with the individual. I'm hungry." _The voice echoed in her head and she smiled and petted her creature. He barked and picked her up, setting her on her feet.

"Thank you, Letalis. Keep close." She said to her creature. For the first time since waking, she took in her surroundings. She was on a flat, featureless grassy patch, on top of a cliff. Far below the edge, the sea churned violently, and she felt rain tapping at her exposed neck and arms. A path led from the cliff to a larger patch of land (around 1000 metres square) below to the north (the sea was on the south side of this peak). The vortex had long since closed, and all around the peak, humans were waking up. People struggled to their feet, shivering in the rain and harsh winds up here. Her people were Native Americans, so they had no warm clothes with them. They shivered in their loincloths and flimsy dresses as the wind tugged at them, their tanned faces pale. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Letalis pick up and injured man and examine him, before raising him to his snout, opening his jaws and biting him in half, then swallowing both pieces. Blood splashed the ground and stained the grass brown, and a slight trickle dripped from the corner of Letalis' mouth.

"BAD WOLF!" Saitaku scolded, genuinely angry. She slapped him across the face hard, and he fell to the ground whimpering. "No eating my people!"

She remembered that he was only little and that she had hit him very hard, so she softened her voice and said to him:

"I wouldn't mind if that man had belonged to an enemy god, but he was one of our hardworking people, and you mustn't eat them."

The wolf gave a sheepish grin, showing his blood-stained teeth.

"_Sorry mistress. I said I was hungry…__"_

"Just…don't eat anyone else, okay?"

She realised that, despite the fact she was a 75 percent evil god, she was beginning to find a place for that wolf in her heart. She came from a long line of evil gods, who had loyally served the Clan, and now that they were (she presumed) gone, what should she do? Come to think of it, she didn't even know what this land looked like, and whether there were any resources or villages. There could even be other gods here for all she knew!

"Stay here. GUARD the villagers (don't eat them)" She told Letalis. He barked his acceptance and sat, watching the people huddling together and whispering fearfully. Saitaku soared up to the sky, hundreds of metres up, and looked down. The land was, indeed, large. It seemed to be made up of three long sections, attached to a medium sized middle section. The first part, she was on, was made up of the cliff, some hilly plains below it, a forest (plenty of wood available then) and a patch of land with a village on, where this section joined onto the middle of the island. The village was a small affair, and appeared to be Greek, judging by the blue/grey slate roofing and stone walls. There were around six small houses, a village store and a village centre making it up.

The middle of the island was like a pie with a slice taken out; it was round, with a triangular piece of sea piercing it to the middle. There was some kind of building on the shore, and she made a mental note to check it out later. There was one village in the middle section, exactly the same as the first, but it was Norse (wooden huts and thatched roofs). The second island section came off of the middle like the first. It, similarly, curved round in imitation of the first, and the first thing she noticed was the temple there. The 'arm' ended in a cliff, which curled, protectively, around a Japanese village. The temple gazed down like a watchful guardian. She noticed that it was neutral, but larger than hers had been on the Clan's island. The Japanese villagers wore cute little kimono's and sandals, and their log-houses were raised above the ground on wooden legs. The village was quite large, and it sprawled down the slopes of a large hill, in the centre of the semicircular land created by the cliff. Beyond the village, on the side that faced her creature's location, were several rice paddies. They were basically the same as grain fields, but larger and semi-flooded at all times. She saw several villagers working this land with hoes and rakes.

The final section of the island was a tall, imposing cliff that rose above the sea further than the one she'd arrived on. It consisted of a path that took the walker to that height. There was a Norse village guarding the top of the only way up, then a short stretch of cliff, complete with pine forest, then a plain stretch of cliff-top area, with a second Norse town. Here there was a parting of ways; one path led to a second wide clifftop area that was uninhabited, the other led to a smaller area of cliff, with two temples built side-by-side. Both were 100 evil, decorated with skeletons of heretics and non-believers, who hung from creaking chains attached to its walls. Huge, curved spikes jutted like tusks from their walls and doorways like gaping mouths faced the village on the cliff section before them.

_**(If any readers who have played black and white one are finding this difficult, just imagine the second land, except **__**larger, and with an extra bit where Lethys should be, which has two temples on it)**_

She sighed; there was no doubt there would be fighting here. She had yet to come to terms with the loss of her teacher, and there was no hope of completing her training. She sighed a second time and a voice accosted her:

"Saitaku!" Toku called "over here!"

Looking at the cliff she had arrived on, Saitaku spotted Toku and Omoi standing there. Both looked dishevelled and appeared to have just woken up, like her. She swooped and landed beside Toku, who was rubbing his temples.

"Trouble?" she asked

"Migrane… I hate portals…" He replied "How are you doing?"

"I'm fine. Omoi?" She said, in a fatigued tone.

"I'm fine, thanks for asking." Omoi muttered, pulling his fringe out of his eyes. "We've been gathering our villagers, they were scattered around that plain in front of us."

Omoi turned and walked over to a group of toga-clad villagers. Their clothes were creased and their sandals scuffed, and many were in shock at the climate-change and indeed, location change. Saitaku felt a wave of depression sink over her: They had no villages, or way of building any, which meant no temple, and no miracles. She sat on the edge of the cliff, green stalks of grass shivering in the cold breeze. Toku sat beside her and put an arm round her shoulder nervously. He had never actually done this kind of thing before.

"Don't worry. Khazaar died well; he was probably proud of his death." He sighed, guessing her thoughts. "I'm sure he was proud of us, too. He must have sent us here for a reason, and we will find a way to survive."

Without thinking, Saitaku turned and hugged her fellow deity. Good and evil could not be more different, but they were all in the same boat here, and Toku was a kind god, wasn't he? He just wanted to help.

"Every time I turn my back…" Omoi sighed, shaking his head and looking at the pair. He was standing a few metres away, and his Cow creature was leashed and standing nearby.

"_Master?" _Pius' telepathic voice sounded like a man in his mid twenties; still young, but not as eager as the Wolf's. He sounded calm, and composed.

"Pius! You've learned to communicate!" Omoi yelped, dropping his sombre, depressed attitude for once.

"_Yes master, but look!" _Pius turned and pointed out to sea, towards the second part of the island, with the neutral temple. A figure was fast approaching them. Vir and Letalis both alerted their respective owners, and the three gathered together to watch the figure. A group of villagers formed nearby to watch.

"Oh crap!" Toku exclaimed. The newcomer was a god, and he or she had a sword drawn. The three backed off to give landing room, and Saitaku drew her katana, fingers tracing the elegant pattern carved into the handle. Omoi reached up to his chain, and ripped it off. As it left his person, it blurred as though underwater, and then became a mace; a long wooden handle with a spiked weight on the end. Toku raised his hands, and his halberd faded into existence in his grasp. The humans cried out at the sight of their gods preparing for battle, and backed off. The newcomer landed gracefully. She was a tall goddess, with a golden waterfall of curled blonde hair flowing down her back, and a blue kimono with delicate patterns of waves. She moved fluidly as water, and her sandals were expensive-looking (if they belonged to a mortal, they would have been). This delicacy and beauty was shattered by the chunky, battle-worn buster sword wielded by the woman. It was almost a metre long, and the blade itself was a foot wide. Feathers and ribbons decorated the pommel, flowing like a stream when she moved.

"Harpy allies!" the goddess cried, accusingly. She swung the blade in an overhead strike that would have cleaved Omoi's head in two, if Toku hadn't parried the massive weapon for him.

"We don't know any 'Harpies!'" yelped Omoi, his posture and cool vanishing for the second time that day. The blonde narrowed her eyes and swung back to a guard position.

"You're not allied with the Dark Clan?" She asked, suspiciously. Her Sapphire eyes glinted at them.

"No: quite the opposite! They destroyed our home, Clan Headquarters, and killed out teacher!" Saitaku said, rage building at the mere mention of the name of the hated Dark Clan. Their attacker sighed and sheathed the massive weapon across her back.

"I am sorry." She sighed, wearily "We of the Clan have many foes. Two of which I am at war with here. Did you say Clan Island was destroyed?"

"We assume so. When they got to us, there were no other gods around, and we saw smoke coming from the direction of the temples."

"Alas." She sighed "It is a sad day for us. We are all but defeated. The few survivors are scattered around other lands, and will be easily picked off. We are the only group, I expect."

"What is your name, goddess?" asked Toku, politely.

"They call me Caledra." She told them, her piercing blue eyes scanning the newcomers to her island. "And it looks like you lot are in need of a new teacher. I have a deal for you guys."

"Fire away…" Saitaku muttered.

"I'll not lie here: I'm loosing the war I am fighting. It's two against one here, and I can't hold them off forever. If you help me in my war, against the Dark Clan, I will teach and protect the three of you."

Her voice held a lot of power and superiority for someone who appeared only a few years older than them to the human-eye. The three couldn't help but respect her. There was no deliberation about it. Sure: they might die in a war with other gods, but they would die in a few weeks if they didn't have temples, anyway. They all wanted revenge for the deaths of their teacher and comrades at the Clan, and this was a way for them to get it.

"We agree to your terms, Caledra." Toku said, after a moment's pause. The others nodded.

"Excellent. We shall start training when you are settled. That reminds me: Here."

Caledra raised her hands and summoned several scaffolds over to hover beside her.

"These are scaffolds" she said "place them down, and you provide your villagers with a blueprint of what you want built, and where."

Three of the scaffolds in question (bundles of wood and nails) hovered forwards, and she set them down, one after the other. There was plenty of space for three villages on the plateau in front of the landing site cliff. Each of the three she placed was for a village centre: vital for starting a new village. She provided them each with scaffolds for a Village Centre, a Village Storehouse, a Large House (big enough to house 20 villagers at a stretch) and a Farm (to produce some food for their villagers. They first built the house and the farm, so the villagers had some food and a place to rest whilst building the more difficult buildings. Caledra provided them with wood and placed three Temple scaffolds on top of the cliff, overlooking the villages.

The four of them spent the first three days building their villages, and then moved onto the temples. It was when these began to take shape that the trouble started…

--

Omoi stood, admiring his temple. It was made of a light, grey stone and looked neutral to any alignment, because there were no decorative spikes, but no angelic statues or marble features. There was, however, a small fountain in the little courtyard in front of the door: Two walls curved round like arms, enclosing a small, grassy area with a little, gurgling fountain in the centre. Pius the cow mooed happily, and went to drink from the fountain.

"_This is great, master!" _he telepathically told Omoi _"The water is sweet! Try some!"_

"I'll be okay for now" Omoi smiled, wryly, I should check on the inside.

"_Should I come?" _Pius asked, standing with water dripping from the corner of his mouth.

"You stay here for now. I'll come back in a bit and I can show you the finished village."

The inside of the temple reminded him of a castle; smooth stone walls in the round entrance foyer, arched, gothic doors around the circular room, and a spiral staircase ascending the walls, to a room in the top of the temple. On the floor before him was a 3D replica of the island, and there were icons representing temples, villages and the locations of creatures. He admired the craftsmanship of it, and then had a quick look around. One room was signposted 'creature room'. Inside, he found a peaceful valley with trees and a river. There was a pedestal with a rune carved into it, which he touched. As his finger brushed it, it blazed to life, suddenly, and Pius materialised in the grass before him.

"_Master?" _The cow enquired.

"Sorry, I accidentally called you here." Omoi sighed. He felt stupid, touching strange runes he didn't understand, but that soon passed. He remembered seeing other gods with tattooed creatures, and decided to try it.

"I'm going to give you a tattoo." He said, abruptly. Pius looked up from the grass he was eating.

"_Very well, master." _He bowed slightly. Omoi focussed his energy into imagining a yin/yang symbol on his palm. A ball of golden light appeared there, and he floated up to Pius' torso, and touched the ball of light to the cow. It sank into the flesh, and burned a Yin/Yang sign there. Pius gave a moo of slight discomfort, but that was it; he showed no signs of pain, and the discomfort passed.

"Okay?" he asked the cow.

"_It's very nice, master." _Pius replied, admiring the beautiful pattern that seemed to be etched (not burned) into his brown and white chest. _"Now can I have something to eat?"_

_Meanwhile _both Saitaku and Toku were admiring their finished temples. Saitaku's courtyard had a statue of her, captured in bronze, holding a katana aloft. She admired the craftsmanship and turned to the group of villagers who were smiling proudly at the temple they had built their god.

"Who created this?" she asked, her voice loosing its cold edge it usually held when talking to mortals.

"I-I did, your godliness…" a young man stammered, kneeling before her and nervously playing with the edge of his fur cloak.

"You did a good job." She smiled at his nervousness but did nothing to calm him. She enjoyed watching villagers squirm with fear when they looked at her. "You may have extra rations this week, and I appoint you the village emissary, you shall be the voice of my people and they talk through you. Got it?"

"Y-yes milady…thank you!" he exclaimed, lost for words.

"You are dismissed…" she said to the crowd, they all filtered back to her village.

Turning back to the temple, she noticed that it was slightly taller than the other two on this peak (they had built the temples together) and the top was becoming a spire. The supports around its base had become pointed, and curled up like tusks on an animal. She smiled at the orangey colour of the stone and entered. She explored each room in turn, and also tattooed her creature. Letalis came out with the three-leg symbol emblazoned on his shoulders and an eye on his forehead. Finally she retired to her bedchambers: the room on the top floor. This was a large room, with a four poster bed that had midnight-blue silk sheets and drapes, and a comfy sofa set on a small balcony that overlooked the entire island (almost). She lounged on this, changing her normal clothes for an elegant purple silk evening dress and bare feet. She looked on at the villagers going about their business and at the swaying of the trees in the forests beyond their territory, then to the Greek village beyond that. She frowned; there was something going on there and she did not like it, some kind of commotion that was spoiling the evening view. She squinted and her vision 'zoomed' to the village. She saw one of the enemy gods there. She realised that at least one of the enemy 'gods' was actually a goddess, like herself and Caledra. This goddess was having her creature impress the town, to capture it. She decided to warn the others.

_In _Toku's temple, it was mostly the same as the other two, except there were a great many paintings and statues to decorate it. His room was similar to Saitaku's, except with an oak writing desk and luxurious armchair behind it. These were stationed so that the writer could look out, through the French-windows and over the balcony, to see the view whilst reading, writing or whatever else you get up to in a big comfy chair. His bedcovers and drapes were made of a green/blue silken material, and there was a painting of Vir the ape on the wall.

"Nice touch…" Saitaku muttered, landing and nodding towards the painting.

"I thought so. What's up?" Toku sighed, in a tired voice.

"One of the Harpy sisters is in that village north of ours, beyond the forest."

"What?" gasped Toku, serious suddenly "If they take that, they'll have a foothold in our territory! We gotta stop them!"

He felt fear grip at his stomach, as he realised he would have to _actually _go into battle. He had no qualms about defending his own territory, but attacking a village would be difficult. Caledra had told them about the Harpies: they were vicious goddesses who delighted in death. How could he, a good god, stand up to them?

"Can't you fight her?" he asked, whiningly.

"No! I've gotta get Omoi and Caledra!" she barked, sounding like Letalis for a moment.

"But I-"

"What are you? A coward?" she snapped. That cut him deep. He looked at his friend, shocked, and then stared at the floor. She realised what she had done and hugged him, hard.

"I didn't mean it like that!" she whispered into his ear.

"Yes you did." He said, suddenly. His harsh, hurt tone of voice shocked her. He pushed her away, and stepped onto the balcony, before taking off and landing in front of his temple.

"Come on, Vir." He muttered, leashing his ape.

"_What is it master?" _the intelligent, curious voice asked in his mind.

"Trouble" Toku muttered, bitterly.

--

**Oh no! Social ****Break-up! Everyone hide from the terrible explosion of violence that will surely take place next chapter!**

**Well, yes, nobody replied so I made up a character. I **_**will **_**however, have another competition. Any gender (male or female) god or goddess can be in this, but I will select a winner. This time, the appearance will be much later, so you guys have more time to put in your Character Bio's. Use this as a guide:**

**Name- Toku**

**Age- appears to be in 20's**

**Gender- Male**

**Appearance- long coat, messy hair, soft brown eyes**

**Weapon- Halberd**

**Alignment- 80 good, currently**

**Creature- Vir the goodish ape**

**Main Civilisation- Norse**

**Happy voting, and don't forget to REVIEW!!**

**Please! I LIVE for reviews! I really do!**


	4. Battles and Heretics

As Toku neared the forest's edge, Vir plodding along behind him, he saw the situation in the village. By the closeness of the goddess' symbol (a red lightning bolt) to the hand on the village centre, he guessed it was almost hers. He had to do something. Vir stood behind him, and nervously chewed on his fingertips, knees wobbling. The enemy creature was indeed, fearsome: A Leopard that stood about a head taller that Vir (in creature terms, that's quite a lot), its hide was a murky yellow/green and was decorated with white spots of all shapes and sizes. Its claws were long and hooked, as were its fangs: designed for tearing. They stood in the cover of the trees a little longer; the smell of damp bark and moss wafting to their nostrils was somehow calming. The goddess herself was perched on a chimney on one of the Greek houses, her high-heeled boots tapping a rhythm on the slates. She was beautiful, in a dangerous way: Her long, black hair fell to halfway down her back, and her long, elegant dress was fur-trimmed and black. She held a massive scythe, casually letting it nestle in her lap as she watched the almost fully evil leopard impress the villagers. The leopard was, currently, dancing. Its long clawed feet patted the ground as it moonwalked, spun and then began to break-dance. Break-dance was the right word; one of its feet clipped a house and smashed a wall to dust. The crowd of toga-wearing humans who were watching all gasped, and the symbol drew ever closer to the pedestal.

"We'd better attack." Sighed Toku, quietly.

"_I'm with you master!" _came Vir's reply.

They broke cover and charged into the town. Toku leapt onto the roof with the goddess, whilst Vir, on his leash, screeched a battle cry at the Leopard and balled his hands into fists. The leopard prepared to spring, but the goddess suddenly summoned the leash and tugged it back, avoiding a creature battle. Now that he saw her from the front, she seemed no older than Toku, but a little less green when it came to combat, it turned out.

"Greetings, god" she said, sweetly and innocently. Her accent was slightly cockney. "My name is **Lola** and this" (she indicated the snarling Leopard) "is Gaius, my creature."

"I wouldn't normally do this, I'm not a violent god, but I'm going to have to ask…ask you to leave this village." Toku stammered, taken aback by her youth and confidence.

"But you haven't even introduced yourself!" She gasped, feigning shock.

"Toku. Excuse me if I don't shake hands…" He said, suddenly realising he didn't have to be afraid of this youth.

"Oooh, confident, aren't you? I like that in a god…" Her scarlet mouth curled up in a smile and her emerald eyes flashed suggestively at him.

"Are you going to leave or not?" he sighed, growing tired of being flirted with.

"I think I'll stick around, actually."

"You leave me no choice." Toku sighed, calling his halberd to his grasp. She smiled at the sight of the weapon, and stood to face him, twirling her scythe. Behind the spinning blade, she smiled dangerously. She could use this weapon as well as her words.

The two readied themselves, and then sprang at each other, wooden handles clapping together and holy/evil blades causing showers of sparks when they clashed.

Gaius and Vir both forgot their hate for one-another, stopped struggling against their leashes and turned to watch. The Greeks could not see the battle as well as the Creatures; it was a blur of blades to them.

--

Lola drew back and attempted to behead him, but he ducked at the last minute, and used her momentum to trip her and knock her down with the handle of his weapon. Her scythe skittered down the tiles, and she almost fell off the edge with it; grabbing the lip of the roof just in time, but loosing her weapon in the process. She hung there, and attempted to summon the energy to fly back up, but there was suddenly a blade at her throat.

"Surrender" Toku ordered, bluntly. She smiled and let go; dropping away from him and landing in a catlike stance on the cobblestone street below. She stood and the scythe was suddenly in her hands again.

"Nice try, big boy…" she called, up at him. He leapt after her, but was met with a blow from the scythe staff, and staggered into a wall. She took an overhead swing, which he parried with his own halberd (barely) and then pushed her back. As he went after her staggering form, twirling his weapon for an attack, she crouched low and swept his feet from under him. He rolled to the left and the scythe blade clashed off of the stone floor, before he lashed out with a kick that knocked her back, and allowed him to rise. They stood, panting and facing each-other.

"You're good." She gasped, leaning on her scythe; he was doing the same thing, pretty much.

"Touché" he muttered, sarcastically.

"This is going nowhere. Let's let our creatures fight it out." She sighed, straightening, and summoning the leash. Toku did the same and Vir appeared round the corner, followed by Gaius. Toku didn't show it, but he was worried: he had been in fights before, but never a creature fight. The big ape was okay, strength and intelligence-wise, but when it came to agility he was outmatched. Behind the creatures came the villagers and they formed a sort of ring, like when there is a fight in a playground. Toku had learned a small amount of theory about creature fights, but had yet to practise it in reality. The god could not really do much in the battle, except prompt the creature as what to do if it was unsure. As he watched, in his godly vision, he saw a ring of white smoke trace itself around the creatures, in front of the villagers. This was invisible to mortal eyes, but if a human came to close, he or she would usually realise they had something better to do elsewhere, and leave.

"_Master, I will try my hardest!" _Vir told him, telepathically. Toku smiled and nodded at him to go ahead. The first blow was struck by Vir. He leapt, suddenly, and surprised the leopard by striking him with a fist to the side of the head. Gaius moved with the blow, using its momentum to spin and kick the ape away, before delivering an uppercut which sent him reeling, and finally a roundhouse kick which knocked him down. He fell heavily and six villagers had to scramble out of the way to avoid his bulky form landing on them. He tried to struggle to his feet, but the leopard bounded forward and put a clawed foot on his neck.

"Vir!" called Toku, desperately. He knew this woman would definitely have his creature killed, but he could not loose Vir!

A howl split the night; an ear-splitting, monstrous call and everyone present looked up at the hill with the woods on it. Letalis the wolf creature was standing hunched slightly, howling at the sky. He lowered his head and the big, yellow eyes fell upon the Leopard. The leopard returned the gaze and stepped off and over the wounded ape, facing down the wolf.

"Rip it to pieces…" Saitaku's voice said, softly, in the wolf's ear. She was floating beside him, just above the treeline. Letalis gave another howl, and bounded down the track towards the Leopard. The Leopard tensed its back legs and sprung, the two meeting in midair and crashing to the ground. The wolf ended up underneath, and kicked Gaius with both of its powerful legs. The leopard was forced off Letalis, who got up and did an uppercut that knocked the sense from Gaius. The leopard swing, clumsily, and missed. Letalis punched it again and again until it lay bloodied and seriously injured on the ground.

"Bitch!" screeched Lola. She raised her hands and there was a flicker of red light. Gaius quivered and faded from existence, appearing back at her temple on the other side of the island.

"That's right, run away little goddess…" hissed Saitaku. She drew her katana, but instead of running, Lola raised her scythe. As they were about to fight each other, there was a crackle of energy, and everyone felt the air get thicker. A bright blue lightning bolt snapped across the sky and hammered into Lola, dashing her against the floor in a shower of sparks. Caledra had arrived from her territory, and was using the lightning miracle to attack Lola. She hissed angrily and struggled to her feet.

"I'll finish this another time." She spat "I have other matters to attend to…"

Lola raised her scythe and faded out of existence, as her creature had, teleporting back to her temple.

"You okay?" asked Omoi, arriving from the forest on the shoulders of Pius. Pius went to Vir and knelt beside him, mooing pitifully.

"I'm fine, Vir got beaten badly though…" Toku muttered, bitterly. Caledra went to Vir and knelt beside him. She raised her hands, and a small sphere or rainbow-coloured light faded in around the injured ape. The sphere seemed to absorb the wounds and pain from him, and then disappeared afterwards.

"_Master…" _the ape sighed, standing up and staring at the floor _"I'm sorry for loosing…"_

"That's okay…" Toku smiled, scratching his chin and belly. "You tried your best."

He turned to Saitaku:

"And I'm sorry for over reacting earlier, and for not holding her off for long enough." He said. She smiled, genuinely nicely and replied:

"I know, I'm sorry for doubting you. You fought brilliantly. You should be proud."

Caledra approached them, Omoi at her side.

"You both did well. I need to teach you some miracles to defend yourself with." She said, thoughtfully. "Actually, I can do that now if you want."

"Now sounds good." Omoi said, slightly sarcastically, brushing his fringe from his eyes.

"Fine, follow me to your villages." She said, walking through the woods.

--

_The _three villages were all pretty close together, as they shared a site. Saitaku's was at the foot of the temple-cliff, Omoi's was to the left of Saitaku's on the edge of the shoreline, and Toku's was between the two, near the forest on their side of it. Each consisted of a large house, a village store, a corn field and a village centre: the bare minimum.

The village centre was a totem-pole like structure, with its owner's creature carved in stone to top it off. The totem could be raised to tell villagers to go and pray at their god's temple. The totems had six 'legs': supports for it that ended in small hands. All of their hands were blank, but they knew that most gods have miracles attributed to individual villages, found there. As they got to the rough middle of the three (a point between the three), Caledra stopped, and raised her hands. They saw she was concentrating, hard, and they saw a stream of light come from the palms of her hands and split into three. Each mini-coil of light wound its way to a village totem, and miracles appeared on the stone hands.

"I have given you each a basic set of miracles to experiment with: you each have **Food, wood, water, heal and fireball**. We'll learn about each of them." Caledra said, turning.

"Thank you, Caledra." Saitaku said, gratefully.

"I'll also give each of you a workshop, so that you can build up your villages your own way." She stated. "Practice with the miracles I have given you until I return. Everyone has their own way of casting them: some, like me, visualise them in our heads and they become reality, some do hand gestures and some say a word or spell to activate them."

--

Caledra flew off towards her own land, and the three busied themselves in their villages. Saitaku became frustrated when good spells, such as heal, were difficult to summon, except for with hand gestures. She let out a snarl of frustration, and turned to the left, hurling a suddenly-appearing fireball at a tree. She smiled as she realised that she could cast evil miracles the best. The other two found good miracles came easily, but fireball was more difficult. They concluded that, depending on one's alignment, different miracles are easier to cast. Vir suddenly surprised Toku, by casting his own food miracle into the village store, after watching his master use it four or five times.

"Brilliant! Well done, Vir!" Toku said, making a big fuss of his creature. Vir let out a pleased 'ooook' noise and used it again.

"Cast miracles with the leash in your hand" he told the other two, "Your creature learns the miracle as you cast it!"

Pius and Vir quickly mastered Food and Wood, whilst Letalis eventually learned to create fireballs, and even more gradually; to cast wood. Although she didn't care much for good miracles, Saitaku acknowledged that it would be useful to have wood available when, for example, building a town or whatever. Those were the only three they got to try out that session, because Caledra returned with the Workshop scaffolds.

"When these are built, you can create your own scaffolds." She beamed, proudly at her new students, looking like a student herself for a moment. She straightened the Buster Sword on her back and took a seat on a rock to watch the three set down their workshops.

"Where the hell is my aide?" Saitaku barked, again sounding like Letalis. A second later, her village emissary was kneeling before her.

"What is your desire?" he asked, hurriedly adding; "mighty one?"

"Tell the villagers to get this built, pronto!" she ordered.

"I will, mistress, but there is something…" he trailed off.

"Speak." She barked, again.

"…the villagers have a shortage of wood. We require more if we are to build your structures."

"Very well; I shall see to that. You tell them to get started while I sort it out." She muttered. Saitaku turned to Letalis, who was standing nearby, his doglike ears cocked in a curious way.

"You know the wood miracle, fill up their store whilst I take a break."

"_Yes mistress." _The wolf answered. _"May I go and take some villagers from that Greek town to the north, after I have done so?"_

"Yes, if you must." She sighed. She soared over her little settlement to her temple, where she landed on the balcony and changed back into that comfortable evening gown and went to sleep on the bed.

--

"Lazy or what?" asked Omoi, emotionlessly.

"Yeah, I know." Toku laughed. He summoned a water miracle and cast it over his corn field. A small cloud materialised there and rain poured onto it, helping the grain. He showed Vir, who got the hang of it after a couple of tries. Pius, though good, was not as clever as Vir, and took a bit longer to learn it, but he did so, too. Letalis, who was watching the proceedings, tried it out himself, and found it was one of the easier good miracles. He learned it along with the others.

"Lord Toku!" a high-pitched voice babbled. Toku and Omoi turned and saw a little boy of around six, wearing a blue toga fastened with a bronze clasp. He was hurrying towards them from the cliff by Toku's village.

"What is it, little one," he asked, kindly. The boy appeared to be frightened of something, so he picked him up and hoisted him onto his shoulders. The boy laughed, happily, but then bent down to whisper in his ear:

"There's a bad man near your village: he says you aren't a real god!"

"Show me where." Toku muttered, grimly. Omoi went back to his own town as Vir and Toku were directed to the cliff's edge by the boy.

--

Below the cliff's edge, there was a tiny island. It was really a rock, with a grassy top and a couple of trees planted there. On the rock was a man. He wore a toga, but it had strange, crescent moon symbols painted on it, and the man was kneeling before a strange artefact. The artefact was a blue stone crescent moon, the size of a human, with crazy symbols and runes painted all over it. The man began to chant and dance around it, a slow, rhythmic tune which made Toku feel nauseous. He decided that he couldn't allow this to exist, it might start a new religion!

"Vir, take this little boy back to his mum." Toku ordered. The boy giggled happily as the giant ape picked him up and carried him back to the village. Toku himself leapt, and landed on the miniature island. It was almost a hundred metres out to sea, but godly leaps have almost no bounds and he landed safely at the foot of a steep stone staircase that was carved into the side of the rock. Beside him was a one-man rowing boat, moored by the steps. This was how the heretic had got there, he decided. Toku ascended the stairs and came up behind the man, who continued dancing, unaware of Toku's presence.

"Whoever you are, stop!" Toku ordered. The man stopped and turned to face him.

"Ah! The fake one!" the heretic mocked.

"Fake?" asked Toku

"Indeed, real gods cannot…die!" On the word 'die', the man drew a curved dagger from the inside of his toga, and darted forward. Toku grabbed his arm as he stabbed down, and twisted it round, breaking his wrist with a nail-biting crunch. The man screamed and fell to his knees, the dagger slipping away and falling over the edge to the sea below.

"Repent for your sins, and you will be spared…" Toku informed him, firmly.  
"I-I-I repent for-" the man started. The statue pulsed once, with blue light, and his expression went blank, like a zombie. "I…will…not…believe…in…you…" he finished, blankly. Toku frowned and turned away from the injured heretic, to the artefact. He raised his hands and attempted a fireball. At first it would not come, but with effort, a crackling ball of orange flame appeared in his hands. It felt cold to him, and he realised it would become searing hot as soon as it left his grasp. He gazed at the statuette for a moment, before tearing a tree from the ground with one hand, and propping it against the side of the thing. He guessed that just hurling a fireball at it would not destroy it. It would have to be heated slowly. Toku used the fireball to light the tree, which burned the statuette slowly. After a whole minute (of the injured man whining about his broken wrist), the moon shaped thing shuddered once, and cracked in two. The two pieces both caught aflame and burned to dust. He turned back to the heretic.

"Now repent and accept me as your god." He barked. The heretic gazed at him in wonder, and nodded.

"I am sorry for ever doubting you, holy one. You are the true god."

Toku knelt and healed the broken wrist with a heal miracle, feeling the warm tingle of positive energy flow down his fingers onto the wound. The wrist snapped back into place, painlessly, and he helped the man to his feet.

"Now I'd get home and get to work if I were you…" Toku said, sternly.

"Whatever is your desire, holy one." The man agreed.

--

"Trouble?" asked Omoi, when Toku returned. Toku smiled.

"Nothing a bit of kindness couldn't handle: Sometimes you have to be cruel to be kind."

Toku chuckled and Omoi rolled his eyes and got on with overseeing the construction of scaffolds from their new Workshops.

--

**Well that's Chapter Four! The competition still stands: create a character to be in the story! Please Read and Review, and good luck to everyone doing final exams next week!**

"**The only difference between me and a madman is that I'm not mad…"**


	5. The Etiquette of Taking a Village

It was almost two weeks since the trio had arrived on this island. The enemy had not attacked them since then, but they had seen fireballs arcing over Caledra's territory.

"The day's bombardment…" she had called it, shrugging and heading over to extinguish fires that sprang up all over her towns. She had two; her Japanese capital which was saved most of the attacks by the shielding shape of the cliff, and a Greek town which was near where hers joined onto the mainland. It was this which was constantly being attacked by the Harpies and their creatures. Sometimes, they sent foot soldiers to attack it as well, but they were easily slaughtered by Caledra. She taught them much in the two weeks they had been there so far. She taught them how to make their creatures work out to keep fit, if they so chose, and how to use miracles to greater effect. By the end of those two weeks, she told them to capture the town beyond the woods, at the edge of their territory. This was to be their final test before they could fight in the war…

--

"_Mistress…" _Letalis began, mentally nudging his goddess _"the village is just past here. How shall we go about taking it?"_

Saitaku looked at Omoi, Toku and the three creatures.

"I have a plan…" she muttered.

"Cool. We're all ears." Toku said, enthusiastic in spite of his shy personality.

"Letalis and I use fireballs to burn some stuff and injure people…" she began. She silenced protests from the others and went on: "then you guys go in. Heal people and extinguish fires, whatever. Because we're in a clan, our efforts will all add up to the grand total belief."

"Sounds like a plan." Toku said, thoughtfully.

"I dunno, sounded a bit like an elephant to me…" Omoi muttered, sarcastically.

"Quiet, we're going in." Toku hissed.

Saitaku and Letalis unleashed a fireball each. Saitaku's hit the village store, causing terrible damage there and setting the Greek village's food alight. Letalis skimmed his along the ground, badly burning at least nine people, and lighting a house on fire. Saitaku's second fireball killed or injured six more people, and her creature set two more houses alight. The sound of a town bell tolled in warning to the villagers, and people were screaming for help from all around. The flames lit the night sky, and embers danced gracefully through the air as Omoi and Toku led their creatures down to the edge of town.

"Omoi, take Pius and start on this side of the village, Vir and I will go to the other side." Toku instructed. Omoi nodded grimly, and turned to begin extinguishing a burning house. Toku led Vir across to the village store. There, they both used a rain miracle on the building, before healing the six villagers who lay injured around it. Glimmering rainbow light lit the darkness and the humans rose, staring at their unblemished skin in disbelief. The gods felt the belief in them growing as, by healing and watering, they raked in over three-hundred belief. Belief could be measured in units, which made it easier for deities to capture and defend villages. Obviously there wasn't just a big counter with the belief on, but in the god's sub-consciousness there was, metaphorically, a counter.

In the fire, almost all of the village's food had been destroyed. Villagers clustered around the near-empty store sobbing. How would they survive the winter!?

"Let's help them…" Toku said, thoughtfully. Vir nodded and approached the crowd. It parted and he raised his arms. A stream of yellow/green light drifted from his fingertips to a point above the store and grain poured in a steady flow from the shining dot of light. Everyone gasped as he fulfilled their food desire, and then helped them to start repairing by using the wood miracle (the same but with wooden planks in stead of grain). The feeling was frustrating to Toku: They were on the brink of capturing the town! Around ten-to-twenty more belief energy and it would be theirs.

"Just a little more!" he told Vir. The ape stood thoughtfully for a moment, then suddenly put two fingers in his mouth and whistled, sharply, before waving his hands in the air to get everyone's attention. Most of the villagers wandered over to gaze at the big ape. There was a short silence, before Vir suddenly did a magnificent handstand, and then got up and began to dance. Toku was as shocked as the villagers, but it seemed to be working! The people of the village were impressed! He felt the belief exceed that which was needed, and the village was theirs! The people bowed down to the three of them as they entered the town, and Toku scratched Vir's chest and chin: pleased with his good work. Metaphorical fireworks flew up in their vision (a slightly weird effect, but a celebratory one anyway) and the people of the village began to filter back to their houses. It was back to work for them. Saitaku appointed a village emissary and then the good gods made sure the town had enough to eat and the like. They had captured their first town!

--

Meanwhile, at the snowy, clifftop realm on the far side of the island, there was a flurry of activity. Lola was standing in the ankle-deep snow; her black, fur-rimmed dress traced a little track in the surface dusting as she walked. Beside her, the evil Leopard growled and snapped at a pair of fur-clad Norse villagers, who ran away fast.

"Sister" Lola said, stiffly. Her Emerald eyes were reflected in those of her twin sister.

"Sister" Ellim acknowledged. Her eyes were the same colour as her twin's, but her hair was tied in a ponytail and she wore a long, white dress with fur-trimming.

"You wanted to talk to me?" Lola asked after a silence that seemed to span an age.

"I did" Ellim sighed "your raid was fought off by these newcomers, and now they have taken a village that we worked hard to capture."

Ellim's complexion was the same as her sister's: pale, cold and hard. She seemed to have rage building in her bright green eyes as she spoke. The eyes were like looking into cold hard pebbles because she was glaring now, at the other side of the island where the three recruits had taken a village.

"I had no idea, sister!" Lola gasped "Shall we call Lethys?"

"No." Ellim snapped, a little too fast to avoid suspicion "We must deal with this ourselves. They are nothing but trainees who gained a lucky break."

"What is the plan then?" asked Lola.

"We strike tonight. Prepare Gaius and some soldiers. I shall do the same."

Lola smiled as Ellim walked off.

"Sister?" Lola called. Ellim turned and Lola half joked: "Leave the one with the halberd for me to play with."

--

**Oh no! What's going to happen to our heroes next! Does this count as Camping/spawn-killing if they get attacked before they can even do anything major on this island? Why do I get halo and black and white involved in everything? I DON'T KNOW!**

**Sorry for the short chapter! I've not had much time to write, what with exams and revision, so I decided to write the important stuff to the storyline here so that I have a solid structure to come back to when I'm on breaks and stuff. Thanks for the support to my loyal…well read****er**** at the moment, but hopefully there will soon be more!**

**Good luck to EVERYONE taking exams around this time of year and Keep reading and writing. I want to remind you all to post your characters for a prize as a place in the story **

**Wedge :3**


	6. Darkest Hour

**After a short break, I am currently (as I write this) over ½ way through my exams!**

**English Language GCSE was brilliant: one of the two questions I did was "describe a dream world'. Guess which dream world I described!? A mixture of Black and white Island 2, Shadow of the colossus and Myst! Woohoo!**

**Anyway, here's the Chapter promised!**

--

Caledra was watching the young gods (and goddess) potter about their villages. It was surprising how much there was to do in a single town. They had a little more work to do, looking after the Greek village that they had taken that day. Well, technically, Omoi and Toku were tending the villages. Saitaku was over on the other side of the Greek village, launching fireballs over at the village on the middle section of the island. If they took that, they would have a gateway into the snowy realm which was home to the Harpies. Caledra was proud at their quick adaptation and learning which meant she now had three worthy allies in this combat. This turned her to wondering what she would do when the Harpies were gone. It had been longer than she cared to remember since they had invaded her lands and enslaved her people. She still looked young in her humanoid form, but she was really at least ten times the age of the newcomers. She was currently above her temple. As she turned slightly, she saw something; something bad, coming from the Harpies' mountains.

"Oh crap" she hissed to herself, before drawing her buster sword from her back and heading towards the trainees.

--

Laughing and joking, Lola and Ellim flew low to the ground, leading their respective creatures towards Caledra's land. Gaius the leopard growled and tugged on the leash as he was tugged towards the village, but stopped when he smelled humans for the eating. Ellim's creature was a tiger, about a head taller than Gaius. The tiger was heavily built, with a six-pack visible on his white-furred belly. His dark striped back glinted in the dying sunlight, and he snarled, causing foamy saliva to drip from his sabre-fangs. His glinting, yellow eyes scanned the horizon for any sign of danger to his mistress. His name was Dirge, the fully evil tiger.

Behind the gods and their creatures, there came a rowdy horde of fur-and-leather-clad barbarians. Almost all of them had bushy brown or blonde beards, and they all carried round shields, broadswords, axes or spears. Bad news for the clan, as there were at least a hundred of them. With a great shout, they burst through the village that Saitaku had been fireballing earlier and charged at Caledra's Greek village.

--

"Damn! Look at the size of that army!" exclaimed Omoi, gazing from their territory at the Norse horde.

"Bad news!" agreed Toku, standing beside his best friend. Saitaku landed nearby and walked over to join them on the cliff-edge. Even from here, it was possible to see the mass of warriors, which looked like a swarm of ants from this distance.

"So boys…" she smiled dangerously "are you ready for some action?"

"Um… I just remembered that there's something _really _important to do in my village…" Omoi muttered, backing away from the others and pushing his fringe from his eyes. Caledra swooped down to land nearby, Buster sword at the ready.

"They're on their way to my lands. Will you help me fight?" she asked, bluntly.

"Yeah, we will!" Saitaku smiled, grabbing both boys by the ear and taking off. They leashed their creatures and headed for the army.

"OW! LET GO OF MY EAR!!" yelled Omoi, clawing at her hand.

"Will you fight?"

"Yes, fine! LET GO!"

Omoi and Toku were released and they floated, rubbing their ears for a while. Caledra joined them.

"Bring your creatures round and attack from the back. I'll muster what soldiers I have and hold them from the front with my creature." She told them. They noticed that she seemed nervous for once (but that's expected of a person whose fate rests on the coming battle), but was trying to hide it. A good teacher does not show fear, lest he or she upset their students.

"Good luck!" called Saitaku, softly, as Caledra flew towards her Japanese town. The three of them joined their creatures in their own Greek town and headed off past the beach on the mainland, towards the encircling foe.

--

"CHARGE!" screamed Ellim. Dirge, the tiger, roared his approval, as the Norsemen swept past the two goddesses and towards the Greek town on top of the hill. A few villagers and watchmen had got bows and swords together and fired arrows down, but they lost few and continued their charge. Ellim and Lola both used an increased fireball miracle; hurling groups of three-to-four fireballs apiece over the heads of their soldiers, into Caledra's Greek town. Most of the arrows stopped as houses burst into flames. The moment the Norse entered the town, everything seemed to slow to a crawl. Caledra did what she could for the people, but her Japanese army was just setting off from her Capital, and her creature was leading it. She was a child of around four or five screaming by the body of her mother, who had a spear protruding from her chest. She saw two of her Greek guards from this town cut down by a trio of Norsemen with swords. Still in slow-motion; a man in a fur cloak appeared through the smoke, swinging a double-headed axe around his head. Caledra swiped with her own blade, which the very air seemed to hold back, and lopped his head from his shoulders. Another came at her from the side and killed her one remaining Greek bodyguard with a spear thrust. Caledra cut him, quite literally, in two vertically. An axe grazed her arm, and she saw a third Norse warrior with throwing axes, at the end of the street. She raised one arm and a bolt of lightning shot from her fingers and into his chest, blowing his torso into ash and bone. She killed another three as they charged her, and then sagged against a wall for a moment's rest. Two of the town guard ran towards her, from an alleyway, shouting that she must leave, but a fireball suddenly dropped from the sky and they became stumbling torches that crumpled before her. As she attempted to heal or put them out, a hairy arm grabbed her round the throat.

"Hello, pretty lady…" a husky voice rasped in her ear. This foolish Norse warrior didn't realise who she was! She struggled, but before she could even free herself, the man suddenly screamed and was dragged away. His loud, pained shout echoed through the town as razor-sharp teeth bit him in two. The bloody halves dropped to the cobblestone street below.

"Cenobia…" she gasped, rubbing her reddening neck. The big, good, lion creature growled and clawed the air, and she scratched his orange-yellow furred stomach. "Where are the Japanese troops?"

"_They are waiting outside the town, Mistress…" _Cenobia told her, telepathically. _"They cannot fight in the burning town; the fire and confined spaces are deadly."_

"Very well…" Caledra sighed, tossing her blonde hair from her face and sheathing her Buster sword. "The battle here is lost; we will draw them out onto the plains between my two towns. There we shall make our stand."

Caledra and Cenobia left the town and approached the lines of red-clad Japanese troops, with their unfurled banners featuring her symbol. Behind them, the Greek town burned and the Norse slaughtered its occupants. Caledra glanced back one more time and saw the little girl who had been crying earlier, felled by a mace blow and Norse simply check her for money or valuables and then leave her lying with a crushed skull. Caledra sniffed, trying to stop herself crying. The Greek town was lost. This final, all-out attack was going to finish her; she knew it: A war that had begun so long ago that it was lost in the mists of time, and it would end tonight.

--

"_May I tear them to shreds, mistress?" _Letalis the wolf barked. She smiled and gazed on at the Norse warriors heading up the hill to reinforce the ones already in the town. The three deities and their creatures were watching from their own Greek town, and had been since the start of the attack.  
"Look!" Toku exclaimed, pointing. Omoi swept his hair from his eyes in disbelief, and Saitaku smiled evilly. The enemy goddess with the evil tiger, Ellim, was standing; isolated on the beach with the strange structure on it (the one Saitaku had spotted on her first bearings of the island). Dirge the Tiger was snarling beside her.

"Let's take her out!" Saitaku growled, her crimson mouth twisting into an unkind smile. Letalis clawed the air and howled to the moon: a haunting sound which echoed off the mountains of the island. "If we do; the enemy will be without a leader."

"You forget" Toku sighed "there's the other one."

"Oh yeah; her…" Saitaku muttered, swilling the words thoughtfully.

"I can go and look for her" muttered Omoi "whilst you guys fight that Bitch…"

"Fine; we're agreed?" Saitaku asked. She noticed how she had almost become the 'leader' of the group…Not that she had a problem with it. She took a moment to gaze at her comrades: Omoi, the sarcastic, emotional god with a tendency to act kindly to humans. Toku, the….

What was it about Toku? Every time she looked at him, she felt a strange pang of loneliness. Every god feels lonely from time to time, but this was different. She hoped she wasn't infatuated: as that was one of the greatest ways to leave oneself weak and open. She sighed and scratched Letalis behind the ears. He looked into his mistress' thoughts, through the link that every god or goddess has with their creature and saw what she was thinking.

"_You like him: don't you?" _he sighed, into her head.

"Maybe… I don't know…" She said. Omoi and Toku had both headed back into their towns to prepare themselves: feeding their creatures and sending people to worship and provide Mana to use miracles. This was the ritual every god or goddess does before a battle, to ready themselves in mind and spirit. The springy turf left wide paw-prints under Letalis' padding feet, as they did the same in their town.

--

"…fall back!" screamed the Samurai sergeant, a second before a spear, hurled through the air, impaled him through the stomach. He fell to one side, dropping his sword, clawing at the wound and mewling like a kitten as he died. There was nothing anyone could do. Caledra and her samurai were loosing. Beside her, the brave fifty or so samurai who remained stood fast, swords and spears killing the enemy waves which rushed them. Blades killed them back and she was surprised her men hadn't turned to run. She was stood on a tumbled boulder among her men; buster sword slashing in bloody arcs as she slew almost two dozen with just a few strikes. The men appeared not to have heard the retreat order, because they kept slashing and dying. She was proud of them for fighting alongside her. The last few Norsemen from that attack wave turned and fled back to the burning Greek town. A great cheer went up from her ranks, and she petted her Lion creature, absent-mindedly. They would be regrouping for the next attack. She stabbed down with her sword, suddenly, and stuck it in the ground. When they came, she would meet them.

--

The heroes and their creatures approached the beach stealthily. Omoi left them and went to look in Caledra's burning Greek village, with Pius, whilst Saitaku and Toku took their creatures down to the beach. Their creatures' paws left large holes in the sand which slowly filled in with trickling sand.

"Finally…" sighed Ellim, turning to face the two Order deities. The Large tiger roared and gnashed his teeth in anticipation of the coming battle, ropes of saliva splattering the sand around him.

"…Damn. Trap." Muttered Toku, as it dawned on him.

"Precisely" Ellim smiled sweetly at them, looking like her sister for once. "A trap"

Behind them, around twenty men in fur cloaks, leather amour and boots emerged from behind a cluster of tumbled boulders and stomped across the sand, wielding axes and spears.

"You deal with them" Saitaku hissed "I'll take on this Bitch…"

She looked pretty pissed off and Toku agreed, automatically.

"Let's take them out!" Toku said to Vir. The big ape gave a warlike screech and bounded ahead of the god, to attack the Norsemen. Vir followed, summoning his Polearm. Vir punched straight down and flattened the first man, before picking the second up and chucking him out to sea as hard as he could. Toku swung as hard as he could and blood sprayed from the decapitated neck of a third man, and broke the fourth's nose and jaw with a backhand before finishing him with a punch to the neck. The next three rushed him and he fought on, doggedly.

"Bring it on." Hissed Saitaku

"My, you're spirited, child…" Ellim chuckled, tossing her hair elegantly. "Unfortunately, spirit does not win fights like this one…"

With that, Ellim summoned a scythe (identical to her twin's weapon) to her grip and swung at Saitaku's neck. The younger goddess rolled to the right and took off into the air. As the gods began to battle, slicing and kicking one-another in mid-air, their creatures leapt at one-another. The lean wolf elbowed the tiger in his stomach, before attempting to do a roundhouse kick. The tiger, however, caught the wolf's foot in his paws and hurled him across the beach. Letalis clambered up and leapt, hurling a fireball as he did so.

Above them, Ellim blocked a swing from Saitaku's katana, causing red and blue sparks to sizzle from the locked blades, before Saitaku broke the lock and spun, plunging the katana into Ellim's side. She screamed a high-pitched cry and almost fell. Ellim's scythe vanished in a flicker of light, and she clutched at the sword-blade, drawing it out of herself. Saitaku suddenly ripped it free and swung at her foe's throat, intending to decapitate Ellim. Ellim ducked and punched Saitaku hard in the stomach, before flying back to make some room between the two of them. She was bleeding slightly, and gods only bleed when they've been badly wounded. Although it was not nearly enough to kill her (the only way to kill a god with a regular weapon is decapitation), she would not be able to fight on.

"One-nil" Saitaku smirked "shall we go again?"

"I'll be back. I won't forget this insult to my family…" hissed her foe.

"I look forward to it…"

"As do I…"

The banter finished as Ellim leashed her creature. Both Wolf and Tiger had come to a sort of tie; as neither was willing to attack and leave an opening for a counter, they had just been circling and trading light punches. Both goddess and creature faded into a haze of purple smoke and that blew away on the salty, sea breeze.

"You okay?" Saitaku asked Letalis, landing beside him.

"_Indeed, mistress. That tiger was a worthy foe."_ The voice inside her head sounded a little tired.

"Good. You're more than a match for him though…" Saitaku breathed, getting her breath back.

"Good fighting" Toku congratulated, looking happy. "I finished those Norse ages ago…"

"Then why didn't you _help_!?" Saitaku growled, exasperated at her friend's statement.

"You seemed to be doing alright on your own. Besides; there had to be someone there to catch you if you fell!" Toku laughed, wiping the blood from his Polearm.

"I'm perfectly capable of picking myself up from KO's, thank you very much." Saitaku was getting irritated. Toku found great sport in teasing her, because she reacted like a volcano erupting.

"Of course you are…"

"Look, shut up! We need to go and find Omoi and help Caledra in the battle." Saitaku snarled. The two gods rose up into the air and swooped towards Caledra's Japanese town. Vir and Letalis hurried there on foot. From the air, the battle seemed bad: There were a lot of Norse warriors charging the thin skirmish lines of samurai, who had been drawn back, right to the gates of their Goddess' capital. Fur clad dead lay scattered all across the plains between Caledra's two towns, a few red-armoured bodies mixed in with them. Caledra and Omoi were nowhere to be seen, but Caledra's Lion creature, Cenobia, was leading the defence.

"Are you okay there?" Toku called to Cenobia. The lion looked up and nodded. He pointed with one claw towards Caledra's temple.

"Thanks" Saitaku muttered, and they swooped up to the clifftop temple.

--

At the top of the cliff, Caledra's temple appeared unharmed. However, Caledra and Omoi were currently battling against Lola. She swung her scythe in wide arcs, causing them both to parry against her, and neither were getting many attacks in. A little further down the hill, Omoi's Cow was grappling with the Leopard commanded by the evil goddess. Both Toku and Saitaku touched down beside the battling gods, and readied their weapons.

"Oh, now that's hardly fair…" Lola complained, sarcastically.

"Quiet!" Saitaku hissed "It's five past your death…"

Lola was about to say something about Saitaku's one-liner but was forced to block a blow from the younger goddess' katana. She then hit out with the haft of the scythe, knocking Saitaku backwards, but leaving herself open to a direct hit from Caledra's buster sword. She blocked it, but then a steel chain-whip wrapped itself around the weapon. Omoi hurled the scythe away, out to sea and Lola backed away so they surrounded her in a semicircle.

"That's cheating…" She hissed, like a cornered animal. She raised both arms and lightning bolts crackled from her sharp, claw-like fingertips. The Clan were forced to dodge this by leaping backwards, and this gave Lola the perfect opportunity to make her escape back to her own realm. On the plains below, the remaining Norse saw their goddess making a hasty retreat, and lost heart. The few that fought on were cut down by Caledra's samurai, and the rest turned and ran.

Victory was bittersweet as the gods looked down on the battlefield. Red armoured corpses scattered around like grains of sand in the wind. The remaining survivors did not cheer, this time, they simply looked relieved. Spattered with gore and mud, they sheathed their blades hesitantly.

"Thank you…" Caledra sighed, sheathing her blade "The day is ours. Without you, I would've been sent back to the great Void…"

"Think nothing of it, ally!" smiled Omoi, brushing his fringe from his face. He stroked Pius, and the other two creatures plodded up the path to join the gods. They were all grateful to have a skilled teacher on their side, and it was the least they could do to help.

"You are a good fighter, leader and teacher…" Saitaku complimented, smiling warmly.

"Well I learned from the best…" Caledra grinned "My teacher was a god called Khazaar."

"Khazaar!?" Toku exclaimed.

"He was my father. I was summoned into being because of the love of two deities, rather than a mortal's prayer."

The three friends looked at each other sadly.

"Caledra…" Saitaku breathed, gently "Khazaar died back on Clan Island."

At those words, their ally looked blank for almost a whole minute. Then her face crumpled and she fell to her knees, tears rolling down her cheeks. They comforted her, but knew it was best to let her mourn. Caledra sent Cenobia to guard her capital, and retired to her temple: eyes red and puffy.

"You think she'll be okay?" Toku asked

"Of course; we goddesses are tough!" Saitaku grunted, proudly. Omoi coughed, and made a show of thumping his chest and muttering about a chest infection (gods don't get ill but it seemed like a good idea at the time). Toku sighed and decided he needed time to think and assess his situation.

"Come on Vir." He told his ape. "Let's go back to the temple…"

--

"Damn! Damn!" screamed Ellim, picking up a fur-clad villager at random and tearing him in two. She carried on screaming curses and beheaded an eight year old child who was watching from behind a tree, then walked back to the Norse's human chief, scythe in hand.

"The men were demoralized! There was nothing I could do-" the burley man stammered, raising his hands.

"Is it not your job to raise their morale?" the goddess hissed. Before he could answer, she lashed out with the scythe, hooking around his torso and slicing horizontally. The man screamed a scream that seemed almost comically high-pitched for a man of his size and stature, and fell to his knees. Pink organs and massive amounts of blood spilled onto the snow, causing it to hiss and melt slightly. He fell to his side, twitching and wailing, thrashing around in the snow.

"You!" Ellim snarled, seizing a random warrior who seemed big and slightly intelligent.

"Maam!" the man saluted her.

"You're the new chief. Shut him up: his mewling is giving me a headache."

"Yes maam. Thank you maam!"

The big man drew a hand-axe from his belt and hacked down once at his former leader. The crying stopped.

"Lola, we must inform _Lethys_…" snarled Ellim.

"I will go through to his land and tell him." Lola sniffed, standing nearby.

"Very well: I will manage the war whilst you are gone…"

Lola walked past the temples to the empty patch beyond at the summit of the cliff. The snow seemed to melt and turn into a pool of slush, which began to swirl like a whirlpool. The slush sunk away, to reveal a whirling mass of colours that lit the night sky like fire. Lola stepped into it, and instantaneously, her form dissolved into a cloud of colours and shades which, in turn, faded to nothing. The vortex shuddered and imploded, leaving a circle of melted snow in its wake.

--

**Well that's chapter 6 up, finally! Sorry it took so long: my final exams were coming up and I had to revise, so I didn't get much of a chance**** to write. Well they're over and I don't think I did all that well, but at least I had fun at my school, and hopefully passed everything (just about). Well that's that for CH6, join us again for CH7!**


	7. Fallen Heroes

_In the mountains to the north, before the sun began to rise,__ three men were all bowing down their goddess. She pointed and they all scuttled away like beetles, through the snow._

_An hour or so later, the enemy capitals were in sight.__ The men all studied their destination carefully. One said something and the other two nodded silently. They approached the joint-capital of the newcomers, blades bared. Seconds later, three guards lay dead on the ground and the assassins separated into the respective shadowy alleyways. Each had a destination. Each had a target._

--

Warm, inviting sunlight gently tugged on Toku's eyelids, and they fluttered open. He was lying in his grand. Four-poster bed, with the sheets wound round him. He realised he'd had a nightmare about his old mentor's death: probably brought on by the revelation that his new mentor was the daughter of Khazaar. He sighed and got up, straightening the sheets out of habit, and sitting down upon the bed. He poured himself a measure of the expensive alcohol on the bedside table and sipped it (well those offerings of food and drink left by humans have to go somewhere!). His head was no clearer than when he had gone to bed the night before, and the whiskey probably wasn't helping. He set the glass down and walked over to the other side of the bed, where a small, elegant water-fountain was set into the wall, and splashed his face with the sweet, cool liquid. Feeling slightly refreshed, he exited the darkened bedchamber and walked onto the balcony, pulling on his usual top and trousers but leaving the coat folded over the foot of the bed.

It was indeed looking to be a beautiful day: the sunrise over the northern mountains where the enemy dwelt cast long shadows over the rest of the land that slowly receded as the sun emerged. Below, the villagers in their villages were waking up and getting ready for their duties. Farmers took up rakes, hoes and ox-drawn ploughs and headed for the fields, builders and carpenters took up saws and hammers and went to the workshops, and the general populace began to get to the day's work. He looked down on their villages with interest. They had expanded vastly since they had arrived. Instead of three separate villages, it was like one small city, with three totems instead of one, and multiple village storehouses. The outskirts held farms and fields, whereas the inside of the 'city' was mainly industrial buildings like workshops and crèche's. Houses played an important part here, too: enough small houses to house a hundred or more people were present. With such a booming population, the city had grown to the second-largest on the island; after the Harpy-Sister's capital, up in the snowy mountains far to the north.

With such a beautiful day, you could almost forget there was a war on, but Toku knew that he couldn't just shut this fact away. The Harpies would never give up until they were dead or had won the war. Toku sighed and summoned his coat, before gracefully descending to the grassy earth beneath his window. Flowers grew here: wild and free as he longed to be. If only there were peace, he could do so much for his people. He walked through the streets, smiling and accepting bows from his villagers, and healing a few sick people. Vir was already plodding about on the other side of the city, watering the crops with a well-executed rain miracle. The other three gods on his side were nowhere to be seen, but Toku wasn't worried. Even when in a clan, gods and goddesses like to be alone sometimes, and he was doing that now.

"Sire!"

Toku turned to see a man in the clothes of a Greek kneeling before him, beard and hair dishevelled.

"Arise: what is it you seek?" Toku said, gently. The man got to his feet, dusting his robes off.

"I have come to warn you of something. I am from the village to the north; on the edge of the Harpies' territory." He told Toku, breathlessly.

"Go on."

"We have no love for the Harpies: they torture us and take our food for their armies. We worship them out of fear." He continued, twiddling a fold in his toga.

"Okay; so you wish to join us?" Toku asked, hopefully.

"Well that is not why I am here, but if you wish we will bow down to you." The man muttered. "The reason I have come before you today is to tell you that one of the harpies has left the island and will be gone for a while."

Toku, surprising even himself, grabbed the man by the collar.

"Is this true!?" He gasped.

"It is, lord!" The man confirmed.

Toku thanked the man, profusely, even giving him the honour of shaking his hand, and then he took off and flew towards the three temples.

--

Omoi woke up, to see his sunlight blocked out by a figure.

"Piss" He muttered, sleepily, and rolled to one side as a long, thin dagger slid into the bedding where he had been lying. Omoi punched the man hard enough to knock his head from his shoulders, but he just fell off the bed and got up again, unharmed apart from a bruise rising on his cheek.

"What the hell?" Omoi muttered, furrowing his brow. The man raised his right fist, and a concealed blade shot from his wrist, turning that arm into a veritable sword. Omoi jumped up from bed. His shirt lay folded on the other side of the bed, so all he wore was his trousers and underwear. Omoi cursed when he realised his neck-chain/weapon was hanging from a hook on the assassin's side of the bed. Now that it was light, he could see the man clearer: He wore a black, hooded robe over a simple tunic and silk trousers. His clothes were all light to allow for easier movement. The killer leaped over the bed in a single bound, but Omoi dodged to the right, so that he was in the emptier floorspace. The man simply rolled to come up standing before him. Omoi felt he should say something sarcastic and vaguely insulting, but didn't get the chance as the man swung his wrist-blade at his neck. Omoi ducked and drove an uppercut into the man's throat. Whilst the man was reeling, he grabbed him round the neck and held his arm behind his back. The struggle was short-lived. This man seemed to be a lot stronger than a normal human, but nowhere near the godly ability of Omoi. The god punched him in the side of the head, and then shoved him against the railings of his balcony. The man made one last attempt to get free, but then Omoi summoned a fireball. He hurled the screaming comet that had once been a man from the upper balcony of his temple and watched him hit the ground below. He could see the assassin's body shudder as it hit the ground, and the bones shattered beneath the flames. Omoi cracked his knuckles and pulled his shirt and weapon-chain on. At that moment, Toku landed on the balcony.

"What the hell happened there?" he asked, gesturing out at the assassin's burning corpse.

"Assassin…" Omoi muttered, shrugging dismissively.

"Why would someone send an assassin to kill just you?" Toku mused.

"Unless they've sent three, but you just haven't met yours yet?" Omoi added.

"Oh yeah…" Toku muttered.

"Saitaku" they both said, simultaneously.

--

They touched down on the dark stone balcony that belonged to Saitaku, and burst in, weapons drawn. Toku was horrified at the sight before him, but both gods snorted with laughter after a moment of taking in the scene before them. Bits of the assassin were scattered around the room. In the very centre of the bedchamber, Saitaku stood. The torso of the man was lying beside her, and she had skewered the head on the end of her katana. Blood had sprayed up the walls and across the drapes, and was painted halfway up the evil goddess' arms.

"Nice gown." Omoi muttered, sarcastically. Saitaku wore a long, frilled nightgown with pretty flowers sewn in with the cloth, completely at odds with the bloodbath of her room.

"I'm pissed off, so I'm really not in the mood for this…" was her reply.

"You okay?" Toku asked her.

"Fine: it was just an assassin." She smiled. "Besides, I sleep with my katana under my pillow."

"Why does that not surprise me?" Omoi asked, as no-one was listening.

"We really need to start going on the offensive. Little by little they're going to wear us down, and one day they'll get lucky and kill one of us." Saitaku growled, wiping the katana on the dead man's robe. She could just will it clean but it was all about her image.

"I agree…" Toku said, thoughtfully. "I have received word that one of the sisters has left the island temporarily."

"Well what are we waiting for?" Omoi exclaimed, excitedly brushing his fringe aside.

"I need to get dressed…" Saitaku muttered.  
"You look rather fetching as you are…" Toku chipped in. Saitaku glared at them and her slender fingers drummed the cloth-wrapped handle of her sword.

"Point taken, let's go!" Omoi muttered, pulling Toku towards the balcony.

--

Fully-clad, the three gods leashed their respective creatures and left their capital. They decided to walk through the little pine forest that came before their captured-town, to gather their thoughts.

"How do we do this?" Omoi asked.

"Well the town to the north, in front of the mountains, is already weak from Saitaku's fireballing. I say we take that and use our momentum to take the next town up and then move onto their capital." Saitaku told them and neither disagreed with her: it was a good plan and she was the strategist among them.

"_Mistress" _Letalis barked into her mind. _"I wish to finish what I started with the Tiger, if that is the creature that remains in their territory."_

"You may do so." Saitaku agreed. The big wolf had a scar on his right cheek given to him by the Tiger, and intended to pay him back tenfold.

They left the forest, past their newer Greek town, and crossed the centre of the island. However, as they neared the town at the foot of the mountain territory, they all felt something strange tugging at their essences.

"Trainees" Caledra's voice echoed through their minds. All turned and saw her fly over, sword sheathed on her back and blonde hair streaming over her back in the air-currents.

"Caledra, are you okay?" Saitaku asked, taking her hands in her own.

"Fine, but I have much rebuilding and re-populating to do." She sighed. "I will not be of much assistance in your battle."

"It's understandable after the news you just received. Leave it to us, ally." Omoi said, warmly.

"I just came to wish you luck. Although she is alone, Ellim is still strong. Remember to use your god powers from the towns you capture." She fussed.

"Thank you for teaching us everything we know about being a true god. You could become a teacher when we defeat Nemesis and rebuild the clan headquarters." Toku smiled.

"Maybe I will. Just remember: this isn't the last you shall see of me." She smiled.

The three clan members turned back to the prize as Caledra flew back to her shattered lands. The town at the foot of the mountain was unmistakably Greek, because of its tiled roofs and stone walled houses. It was a small town, only around fifteen people, but had some pretty interesting miracles on the totem.

"Let's do this!" Toku said. Both his friends nodded and they all readied themselves.

"Wait!" Omoi said, suddenly. He pointed and they all watched. Dirge, the tiger which belonged to Ellim, was coming down the mountain path towards the town. With him were four villagers with empty sacks on their backs. As they watched, the villagers entered the town, took most of their grain and meat from the food-store and then left, guarded by the tiger.

"I know a better way: leave this to us Saitaku." Omoi muttered. She folded her arms in a bored way, as the two good gods headed to the little village.

"Heal!" Omoi exclaimed, monotonously. The villagers who had been injured in the bombardment Saitaku had given them a few nights ago got up, looking shocked and ecstatic as their burns and broken limbs righted themselves. The rainbow coloured light that drifted like smoke from Omoi's fingertips seemed to seek out the wounded. They felt their strength on this edge of their realm grow slightly, but steadily. Toku approached the village store, and cast the food miracle, causing a stream of grain to pour from a point above it. When it was nearly full, he cast the wood miracle, too, sending piles of wooden planks tumbling into the wood-store. As the two gods impressed the villagers, so did their creatures:

"MOO!" exclaimed Pius, casting his own wood miracle directly beside some damaged houses, their tiles or walls smashed. People immediately began to rebuild. Vir gave a loud "oook!" and whistled to attract people's attention. When they looked, he leaped onto one hand, and performed a one-armed handstand. People cheered, and he got up. He arranged the watching crowd into a circle, and began to dance, whistling a tune that seemed to come naturally to him: a kind of beat which got people on their feet dancing with him. Finally, he and the cow both simultaneously performed the heal miracle, filling the entire town with a blaze of rainbow coloured light. The people cheered and clapped, and the joint symbol of Omoi and Toku (their two symbols combined to form a new one) blazed intensely above the houses, and bursts of light flickered like fireworks above them.

"Well done!" congratulated Omoi, petting Pius. Toku flew straight to Vir and gave him a hug round his large neck.

"Yeah, we're really proud of both of you!"

"_I did good, master?" _Vir asked, scratching an armpit with his humanlike hand.

"You were great!"

"Yeah: you too Pius!"

They all looked down at the villagers below them, who were partying at the concept of a new god (well gods). Food was plentiful for once, and they all sang and danced. Toku smiled.

"Well it looks as though they are happy." He grinned. Toku realised that something strange had happened to him. His eyes, normally dark brown, had become brighter and more alive. His coat had gone from being leather to a brown/grey cloth one, with a split down the back, and his trousers and shirt showed the most change in alignment: both were bright white.

"Look at me!" he said in wonder. Omoi smiled and realised that he, too had become almost completely good: His hair was still dark and long, but his eyes showed that he was truly happy beneath his miserable demeanour. His shirt and trousers had become white, like Toku's, and his chain was gold instead of silver. Both creatures showed a change in alignment, too:

Pius had gone from being a brown and white, regular cow to a black-and-white dairy cow, with only small, blunt horns.

Vir, who had started with thick red fur and long, wavy hair on his head, but had now lost that hair, and was beginning to show patches of golden fur beneath the red.

Unfortunately, the celebration was short-lived. There was a snarl of rage, and both gods were forced to duck a scythe, which spun through the air towards them.

"Don't think you can take my towns and get away with it!" Ellim roared, catching her scythe as it came back to her, boomerang-like.

"Looks like we just did" Omoi shouted back. The evil goddess was floating above the mountains, and they were almost fifty metres away.

"Yeah, try and take it back: see what happens" Toku interjected. She laughed: a harsh bark, and adjusted her Nordic-style dress.

"These people here are corrupted by their belief in you. I will kill them all and repopulate the town with people from my Capital. That is after I kill you, by the way…" She chuckled. Saitaku suddenly appeared at their side.

"This is my time to shine: leave this to me, boys." She hissed, drawing her katana from her belt. Letalis ran forward, up the mountain pass towards the goddess, but was met half-way by Dirge. The tiger gave a screeching roar, and slashed the air. The tiger was big, but Letalis had been training for this. He was almost the exact same height, and was much more muscular than when they had last fought.

"Kill the kitty, Letalis. I will kill this pathetic excuse for a goddess." Saitaku cackled, giving a couple of swings at empty air to emphasize her point.

The four combatants sprang at each other.

Letalis got the first hit in against Dirge. The big tiger lunged in an attempt to grab him, but the lither, faster-witted wolf dodged to the left and elbowed him in the side. The tiger roared, and Letalis ducked a double-fisted swing to the side of his head, and came up with an uppercut that broke his jaw. Dirge roared again, a muffled yelp of pain as the jaw was smashed out of place and hung awkwardly. Dirge butted Letalis in the snout and grabbed him round the throat. Letalis whimpered as he felt his windpipe being constricted, but held his breath and grabbed both of the striped, muscular arms. Slowly he began to force them away from his neck. Then he let go and punched Dirge in the stomach: lightning fast. He roared in pain and staggered back from the blow. As he was reeling, Letalis jumped at him, with a full-body tackle. Too late, Dirge realised what was being done: Because they were fighting on the road up the mountains, they were high above the sea, to their right, and that was where Letalis was forcing him to. With a last, powerful punch, Dirge fell backwards.

High above them, Ellim was winning the battle. Her every blow was measured to a purpose and with a final snicker-snack of the blade, Saitaku's katana spun earthwards and left her unarmed. She pulled back for a beheading strike, when something happened to her. Ellim screamed and clutched her head as the force which mentally connects a goddess to her creature was torn away. It was like having a part of you ripped away. Her pain, both physical and psychological, was too much and it was all she could do to stay airborne:

Far below, Dirge lay dying; impaled on the rocks at the foot of the cliff. Blood soaked his beautiful coat, and he twitched once, then his conscious thoughts and feelings faded to nothing. He was dead. Ellim dropped her scythe and screamed a scream of agony and horror: a scream not unlike that of a mother who has lost her baby.

"Noooo!" She screeched. Raising her hands, the clouds above the newly-captured town swirled and darkened.

"Increased Storm" she sobbed. Purple/green light gathered around the palms of her hands, and the sky obeyed. Rain lashed the partying villagers below and many rushed to their homes. A bolt of powerful lightning dropped from the clouds and smashed into a house: blowing a hole in the roof and setting it alight. As the storm began to ravage the town, Ellim gathered her furs about her, and flew back to her temple.

"You two make sure the town is okay. I'll go after her!" Saitaku ordered. The two good gods nodded and she ran up the mountain on foot, closely followed by her Creature.

Lightning bolts began to bombard the little town, and people were dying. The pair made a good team in the crisis: Omoi healed the people, and Toku threw up a Spiritual Shield: a big, glowing pink dome. It was translucent, so they could see the lightning bolts that fizzed and burst against the outside of the shield, making it ripple like water. Rain also ran down the side in sheets, and none reached the village.

"Nice one…" Omoi sounded exhausted as he healed the last few villagers and slumped against a house.

"You okay?" Toku asked.

"Yeah, just used too many heal miracles: it's sapped my energy."

"Fair enough… I'm going to go after Saitaku; you keep the shield up until the storm is over."

"Sure, go ahead." Omoi waved him off.

--

It seemed that the storm had spread up here, too. Saitaku had arrived at a small town that was halfway to the enemy capital. It was Norse, you could see by the architecture of the thatched houses.

"Might as well…" thought Saitaku, to herself. She decided to take over the town to further weaken Ellim's strength. She checked on what miracles had become available to her by owning the previous town.

"Lightning, Storm, Flock and Increased Food…" She muttered, ticking them off a metaphorical list. Rain trickled off her nose and shoulders, so she decided to warm things up a little. She summoned a crackling ball of flame, and then concentrated more energy into it, turning it into an increased version. She hurled it at the town, and watched it divide into four, normal-sized balls of flame, which bounced and skimmed the ground to set people, crops and houses alight. Screaming and the smell of burned meat wafted to her and she grinned, toothily at it. The rain quickly extinguished the flames of her attack, and she frowned. Although the villagers were impressed, they needed more encouragement. She raised one hand and energy sparked around it.

"Lightning!" she ordered, sternly. A single bolt of lightning whipped and crackled from her fingers and slammed into a house, demolishing the walls. The ceiling fell in, and the inhabitants were crushed. To finish it all off, she cast Miracle Flock. A flock of leathery-winged red bats hooted and screeched as they fluttered through the town. This drove the people over the edge, and they prayed to her for mercy. All at once, her symbol appeared, flaming and bright, above the village totem, and she felt power flow into her like a bowl dipped into a lake of energy. Letalis growled and snapped at the air.

"_We should move on! We need to finish her now!" _He snarled. She petted him, noticing that his ears were longer and his coat was a glossy black colour.

"When did you become this evil?" She asked. He smiled, baring his fangs.

"_Dirge begged for mercy and I hurled him from the cliff. Besides that: you've been gradually becoming more evil, which has caused me to change too." _

"I like! It's a good look for a fine wolf such as you…"

The pair continued past the town, to the capital. This was a massive village, with over a hundred-and-fifty villagers there. It was built on the large ice-plains that dominated the top of the mountainous region. Thatched cottages were the main place of residence, and they were everywhere. The other side of the village housed the two temples of the Harpy sisters. The temples had a shield around them, sizzling and flickering in the rain, its orange translucency distorting the image of everything inside it. Despite the flickering, the shield looked too strong to break conventionally.

"We have to take the town. Without the belief of her capital, Ellim will have no power to hold her shields up." Saitaku told Letalis, thoughtfully.

"Need a hand?" Toku asked, landing beside her.

"Sure. Let's massacre these people!" Saitaku chuckled.

"Ahem…" Toku protested, looking sourly at her.

"…kidding! Kidding! I do the killing, you do the healing: Deal?"

They set to work. Letalis and Saitaku hurled fireballs (Saitaku's now 'increased') over the heads of the townspeople, igniting some outlying buildings and people who were too stupid to move. Vir began to do tricks and dancing to impress the villagers, causing them to build up into a crowd. Letalis howled, a blood-curdling cry, and leaped into the crowd, stamping villagers to the ground, but trying not to kill many because as he bounded away, Toku cast a shield of his own over the town, and healed the villagers, giving them the feeling of security their goddesses had never provided them with. Toku then topped up their store with food and wood, before the two deities finally captured the town with a combined miracle Flock: leathery-winged blood-red bats and beautiful, magnificent white doves fluttered over the heads of the humans, contrasting to form a beautiful image of balance and equality between evil and good. There was a blazing feeling of victory and power for the clan-members and their symbols appeared, blazing bright against the evening sky, over the totem. The fur-clad people clapped and cheered, as their new gods walked, hand-in-hand through their town, towards the shield that protected their former mistresses' temples.

"Ready?" Toku asked Saitaku.

"Hell yeah: I've wanted to do this for a _long _time!" she replied, grinning evilly. Saitaku raised one slender arm and concentrated her energy into a lightning miracle. However: since they had the enemy capital, they had their most powerful miracles:

Lightning increase, Storm increase, Rain increase and powered-up versions of both shields were their newfound abilities.

"Increased Lightning!" she growled. A powerful electrical ray sizzled against the shield. Three seconds later, the shield collapsed with a subsonic hiss, and a flicker of orange. The temples were exposed.

"Let's do this!" Saitaku roared. Both leashed their creatures and sent them forward to attack the walls of the shields. Powerful blows from the athletic wolf and the chunky ape made cracks in both temples, and the gods could feel the enemy's foothold in this land slipping away: blow by blow. Suddenly, Saitaku felt a blow to her back. She flew forward, but righted herself and spun to face her attacker.

"Why did you have to come here? You've ruined _everything_!" Ellim screamed at her, slashing left and right with her scythe. Saitaku dodged back. Tears streamed down her enemy's cheeks as she came in with an overhead strike, that Saitaku dodged and countered with her own, diagonal strike. The slash connected but wasn't damaging enough to draw blood (it takes a lot to do that to a god).

"You destroyed my home!" Saitaku screamed back, almost spitting the words as she attacked again and again. She punched Ellim in the stomach with all her might and the older goddess smashed into the ground below. Saitaku came down to stab, but her foe rolled to the left and the katana sliced into the snow and ice. They circled each-other, blades clashing and sparks flying. Neither used miracles, and it was just as though they were two mortals.

"You want some…ah…help?" Toku asked, dreading the answer.

"No! Stay away! She's mine to kill!" Saitaku screamed at him. Shocked, he drew back and the two goddesses continued to parry one-another's attacks. However: Ellim was severely weakened from the loss of her people, and so her fighting skill suffered from this too. She slashed to the right, and Saitaku blocked with a vertically-held sword. She forced the scythe to the ground with the flat of the blade, before pulling back and striking out. Ellim gasped as the sword pierced her chest, and came out the other side. Her weapon thudded, dully into the snow.

"I…" she choked "I cannot…."

Saitaku twisted the blade in the wound and Ellim screamed, tears coming to her eyes.

"Please don't kill me!" She begged; falling to her knees still impaled on the katana blade. Saitaku grinned in a macabre fashion, before ripping the blade free from her chest, pulling back like a golfer who has taken a swing, and sliced out, beheading the older goddess in a single strike. Her body stayed kneeling for a moment, as the elegant faced head rolled from the shoulders and hit the snow face-down. For a second, nothing happened, but then the goddess' spirit was torn from the body: instead of blood, blinding bright light glared from the neck, shining skywards like a beacon. The two creatures had stopped attacking the temples to watch the fight, but Ellim's temple seemed to shudder, once, then similar bright light burst from all the windows on the spiked monolith, before it shattered. Cracks appeared all over it, and huge chunks fell away before it exploded. They all leapt for cover as chunks of stone were blown flying in all directions, skidding across the snow-blanketed ground or bouncing off the shield Toku had thrown round the capital. Far below, the corpse of the tiger burst into flames and faded into nothing more than ash. To top it all off, a piece of stone the size of a human house smashed into the weakened temple that belonged to Lola, and caved in a whole wall. It collapsed to one side in a cloud of dust

The surviving goddess, Lola, no-longer had a foothold in this realm, nor therefore could return to build up their empire again. No god could remain living for more than a few days in a land that does not have a temple for them to focus their power into. Unless, that is, they possess a Creed: a powerful artefact that makes them more powerful than most gods and goddesses, and giving extra abilities to those who possess one.

There was an approving, slightly surprised whistle, and both turned to see Omoi approaching them, Pius at his side, gazing upon the wreckage of the enemy's home. Behind them, the light faded, and the corpse of Ellim fell to one side, silently.

"What did you?" Omoi laughed "actually: I don't want to know…"

"Look!" Toku exclaimed, pointing. Caledra was flying over to them from her territory. She seemed speechless, opening her mouth as if to talk, but then closing it again in amazement.

"How…" she muttered.

"We've won!" Saitaku squealed, in a girly voice that was a complete contrast to her earlier behaviour. She threw her arms around her mentor, who just stared blankly at the wreckage of the temples. Slowly, as the other two joined the group-hug, a broad smile spread across her weary face.

"The war is over…" she sighed, contentedly. "I cannot thank you enough!"

"Think nothing of it!" Omoi told her.

"I can't believe I'm free to rule and build without having to worry about death or defence!" Caledra sighed, tucking some hair behind one ear, gingerly.

The three laughed and began to disperse, when Toku spotted something, glowing in the wreckage of the temples.

"Is that…?" he began Omoi knelt next to the object and picked it up.

"Yeah, just like it was described by Khazaar…" he agreed.

The creed piece floated just above his palms. It was a ball of what seemed to be light, but it was touchable; slightly warm and numbing to the touch. About the size of a person's head, it sat there, silently. It seemed to be waiting for something.

"She had a creed?" Caledra asked.

"M-hmmm…" Omoi muttered, examining the beautiful object.

"No wonder her powers were greater than those of her sister" Toku exclaimed "but at least she didn't have three: then we'd have been in trouble."

"…When the three creeds are aligned: your soul will be bared, plain to all, and mighty power entrusted to you…" recited Saitaku. She was remembering the small amounts of knowledge Khazaar had given them as to the nature of the creeds. All four deities suddenly span round as, simultaneously, they each felt a sudden presence on the island that had not been there before, like someone tugging at your sleeve.

"I'll be taking that, thank you…" a deep, thundering voice hissed, mockingly.

"Nemesis!" gasped Caledra, gripping her buster sword in sweating hands.

Nemesis was standing behind them, Lethys at his side. Behind the two of them, a vortex whirled. A few loose rocks or plants were swept up and sucked in like a whirlpool in the sea. Lit by the vortex, the two figures were plain for all to see: Lethys, a few steps behind his master, with a smug grin on his face. Nemesis tossed his messy black mane of hair behind his head and held out one gauntleted hand.

"The creed: now!" he hissed.

"No!" snapped Omoi, startling his friends with his determination. He ripped the chain from his throat, and it formed itself into a perfect katana, razor sharp. A sudden wind picked up around the town, ruffling Omoi's hair, and causing the cloak that appeared to be made of shadow to billow behind Nemesis.

"Don't be foolish…" Nemesis' voice was soft now, but that made him all the more terrifying.

"You killed Khazaar!" Omoi roared, accusingly.

"No Omoi!" gasped Toku, realising what Omoi was going to do.

"You'll never stand a chance against him!" Saitaku piped in. Omoi was not listening: He raised the katana and sprinted the ten metres to their arch-enemy. Nemesis reached down and drew his masamune from his belt. He swished it once, but Omoi actually blocked it with his sword.

"Die!" Omoi practically screamed, raining blows on the fully evil god. Most were blocked easily, but a couple that got through didn't even cause him to flinch, or draw blood. Toku and Saitaku drew their weapons, knowing it to be useless but refusing to abandon their friend who was fighting so bravely. However, as they stepped forward, Lethys raised his spear and ran at them. Though he was a coward, Lethys was stronger than either of them, and they both had to fight their hardest to fend him off. His spear lashed out and caught Toku in the stomach, and he cried out, sharply. As he collapsed to one side, a thrust of the long weapon drew a vicious gash along Saitaku's arm. She fought on doggedly. Caledra simply stood, shaking and holding her buster sword near the ground.

Omoi swung for the head of Nemesis, who parried with a lazy swing of his massive sword. The hilts slid together and Nemesis began to push Omoi back. He kept resisting, and Nemesis became bored of this little struggle. He raised a hand, and purple lightning crackled from his gloves' hooked fingertips, into the chest of Omoi. The bolt was extremely powerful: and the god screamed out with pain, falling to his knees. He was scorched and badly injured, but Omoi raised the Katana in one shaking hand. He felt a sharp pain in his torso, and looked down, to see Nemesis' Masamune protruding from his chest. He let out a little gasp and blood flecked his chin and lips. Omoi's eyes opened wide, and the Creed softly rolled across the snow beside him. He whimpered, once, then closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. His katana fell to the snow, and morphed back to its neck-chain form.

"Omoi!" screamed Toku, who also lay on the ground, clutching his stomach as blood flowed from it. Beside him, Saitaku swung again and again at Lethys, who was faltering now, hesitating at the goddess who actually fought back.

Caledra was jolted into action by the scream of her ally. She had been motionless out of fear: she knew no-one had ever survived a battle with Nemesis, but now she had something to fight for: herself, her lands, and her friends. With a great roar, she raised the hefty buster sword and rushed at Nemesis. He was standing and holding the masamune in one hand: impaling Omoi. The other hand made a gesture, and the creed vibrated and rose up into the air, to land in his armoured palm. He made a noise that was somewhere between a grunt and a laugh at the sight of Caledra attacking him, and tore his Masamune free. Omoi fell to one side, mouth slightly open as though he were surprised.

"Give it up!" Nemesis hissed. "You're determination is good and you'd be welcome in the Dark Clan."

"I'd never fight beside you! You killed Khazaar; my father!" Caledra howled, swinging wildly at him. Nemesis blocked with ease and sliced out at her. She just managed to dodge by leaping high into the air. Nemesis chuckled to himself; it had been quite some time since he'd been in a fight as good as this. He swung to kill and found himself blocked again. Indeed she was strong. However, decades of war had weakened Caledra's power, and the destruction of one of her villages had virtually halved the number of worshippers she had: her power was decreasing. Nemesis was a smart fighter, and he had spotted this. For the first part of the battle, he wore her down with feints and weak strikes. When her strength was lowered sufficiently, he knocked her sword from her hand. Her eyes widened as, like Omoi, she was run-through by the long sword.

--

**Author's Note: Background track for this scene is "FFVII: Aerith's Theme".**

She fell beside Omoi, and Nemesis turned and walked through the vortex with the creed: his body dissolving into a haze of colour and then nothing. His voice still echoed through the land, however.

"I enjoyed this bout, but you have turned out to be too weak." He boomed, cheerfully

"Coward" Spat Toku.

"I wish to battle you another day. I will raise the stakes slightly, by taking something you cherish. Until next time…"

Toku and Saitaku felt the bonds connecting them to their creatures strain slightly, but not break. Lethys pushed Saitaku back with his shield, blew her a mocking kiss and disappeared into the vortex too. She ran to Toku, first, and (bracing herself) managed a basic Heal that lent him strength enough to cast his own, more powerful version and cure himself. He was lucky that the spear wielded by Lethys was not imbued with a creed: otherwise the wound would have been fatal.

"Omoi!" he cried out, tears running down his cheeks. "Caledra!"

Saitaku joined him: not crying but pale and shocked looking; then knelt beside the two dying deities.

"Increase…Heal!" Toku sobbed, sending a bright stream of rainbow-coloured light into Omoi and Caledra. The heal reached the wound, but simply slid off and faded away.

"Why isn't it working!?" he snapped, trying again but getting the same result.

"It's too late: they're too far gone…" Saitaku told him, softly.

"I…I'm sorry…" Caledra suddenly choked "I was too scared….too scared and…weak."

"It's okay: just rest." Saitaku whispered, arranging their dying mentor so that she held her sword across her chest. "You were brilliant fighting Nemesis."

Behind them, Cenobia, Caledra's creature, and Pius the cow appeared from the slope. They ran to their dying owners, and also attempted to heal them. At that precise moment, Omoi coughed and opened his eyes again.

"Toku…" he gasped "Saitaku…"

"We're here…" Toku murmured, smiling through his tears. He gripped Toku's hand. Saitaku did the same to Caledra.

"The Void is calling me…" he rasped, staring skywards "…I'm sorry I couldn't protect the creed…"

"Don't apologise… Please don't die…" Toku stammered, tears falling freely to the snow.

"So…cold..." Omoi sighed "…I'm slipping…"

Toku felt Omoi grip his hand tightly, once, then relax. He fell back to the snow. Beside them, Pius mooed in distress and a single tear fell from his eye at the death of his master. All of a sudden, light blazed from the eyes of the big cow and his master, and then their entire bodies were aflame. Pius didn't look like he was in pain, but when the flames burned out, a few seconds later, both God and creature had disappeared. Omoi's symbol; the Yin/Yang, hovered in the air, glowing like a star for a moment, then it faded from existence. Toku looked at his hand which, a moment ago, had been gripping onto the best friend he had ever had. He sniffed and wiped the tears from his grimy face, before setting his jaw and standing. Beside him: Caledra gasped in shock, and she, too, blazed brightly with her Lion creature. When the light had faded, her lion-head symbol was disappearing overhead, too.

--

And so on that fateful night, Toku and Saitaku found themselves to be the only surviving members of the clan. When they called to their creatures, they found them to be gone. They then understood what Nemesis had meant by: 'I shall take something you cherish' and they were furious and distraught at the same time. Toku felt truly alone without Omoi to joke with. True he had Saitaku with him, but she was a different kind of friend: one that he had a crush on, not one that shared his sense of humour or even alignment. He sat alone in his darkened temple and wondered what to do next.

--

**Well there you have it: Omoi is dead; his temple crumbled and his creature gone. I had to do it and hopefully (when I get round to writing it) I can explain why he had to go (not that any of you cared about him, I guess, but I liked his character and Idiosyncrasy of brushing his hair aside).**

**This, by the way, is the penultimate chapter. The next chapter will be the final one in this story. I know it hasn't been a very good one but I enjoyed writing it and I just wish there had been more reviews.**


	8. Memories for the Future

**Theme here would be 'Joshua Radin: Winter'**

It was sunrise, and Toku gazed out across the island that, he supposed, was theirs now. Saitaku had gone to take her anger and frustration out on some poor villagers, so that left him to decide what to do next. Villages dotted the landscape and, now they were theirs, he could sense the people getting up and going to work. He guessed he should be fulfilling his duties as a good god, but he felt strangely tired and nauseous every time he looked at the scorched patch of ground where Omoi's temple had stood. Pieces of marble masonry lay scattered like unwanted toys around the temple's cliff. He supposed he was lucky they had missed his temple, but he didn't care, really. Another factor in his depression and sadness was the loss of his creature: Vir and Letalis had gone missing and by the hint Nemesis had dropped the previous night, he guessed they had been taken to another land. Without Vir, Toku felt cold and exposed to the Void. He couldn't remember it being like this before he got his creature, but they say you only appreciate something when it's gone. As he sat, considering these theories and sifting through his memories, there was a thud outside.

"Hey…" he sighed, glancing up as Saitaku entered his room, sheathing her bloodstained katana.

"How's your stomach?" she asked

"Healing…" he replied. "Oh and I never got to thank you for that."

"Think nothing of it, Toku"

"…So, what now?" Toku asked.

"I think it's obvious!" Saitaku said, raising an eyebrow. "The vortex is still there: we go after them, get our creatures back and kill Lethys and Nemesis."

"It's obviously a trap…" sighed Toku, head in hands.

"Listen to me" Saitaku suddenly snapped, angrily. "Do you miss your creature?"

"Obviously!" Toku was taken aback at her attitude.

"And aren't you angry that Nemesis killed Omoi?"

"Yes, I am!"

"…and what about the others: Caledra, Khazaar and the rest of the clan?"

"Of course I'm angry, but I'm just a lowly good god. I can't fight Nemesis!" Toku stood as he shouted this: surprising himself with his anger. Saitaku simply smiled; her cherubic mouth twisting into something between an attractive grin and a sneer.

"Well pull yourself together!" She hissed in a low voice, grabbing him by the scruff of his neck. "We fight together. Only together can we avenge the Clan, and Omoi, and recover our creatures."

Toku was about to come back with a sharp retort, when he realised his fear and depression was gone. He smiled and shrugged on his coat.

"We're going to need a lot of supplies if we're going to a new world…"

Saitaku smiled again and, on the spur of the moment, kissed him on the cheek.

"I knew I could persuade you! Let's go kick their asses!" she shrieked happily.

--

Toku was gathering supplies and scaffolds when he remembered Omoi had dropped his chain before dying, as had Caledra with her sword. He retrieved these weapons from the snow, and arranged them into a shrine, of sorts, on their temple plateau. He stabbed the sword into the ground and hung the chain around the hilt. He then knelt before this memorial and muttered:

"Rest well."

"I will; thank you…" a familiar voice answered him from behind. Toku whirled and saw Omoi standing in his scruffy clothing and long black hair.

"You're alive!?" he gasped. Omoi simply smiled and gazed at the little shrine.

"There was a lot I wanted to do before I died: and killing Nemesis was one of my tasks."

"So you want me to go for you?"

"Look around you and you'll find strength in everything. That should tell you that you are infinitely strong, even when you feel weak." Omoi told his friend. Toku turned to look at the tribute, and said:  
"I don't feel strong. Do you really think I can win?"

"Who are you talking to?" Saitaku asked him. Toku turned again, and saw that where Omoi had been standing, Saitaku now stood before him.

"Omoi was…" he muttered.

"There's no-one here, Toku." She said, sadness hinting in her voice.

Toku simply turned and looked back across the island they had fought together on.

"Come on; there's a lot to do if we're going through that vortex." Saitaku said, gently touching his shoulder. He stood and flew away from her, to one of his villages for scaffolds.

Gradually, the twin piles of general village-building 'stuff', and huddles of people grew beside the whirling mass of nothing. Altogether: they readied almost a hundred people, a few-dozen houses, two village totems and storehouses, two workshops and countless amounts of food and wood.

"Ready?" Saitaku asked Toku, an encouraging smile playing across her face.

"Always; let's do this…" he replied. Together, shoving everything in ahead of them, they stepped into the vortex and everything dissolved into a cloud of rainbow colours and impossible shapes, and they were whisked away.

Whatever was waiting for them beyond the portal; they would be ready for it.

--

_Well there'__s Order and Chaos finished. I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I have enjoyed writing it. I only wish I had more reviews, but thank you to those of you who did review. I'm sorry custom characters weren't featured in this one, but maybe another time, there will be room. The next story will be coming soon and I hope you're looking forward to it as much as I am :)_

_Regards_

_**Wedge**_


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